The paper uses function analysis to complement the analytical framework Institutions of Sustainability and to apply it for the analysis of the role of institutions for the multifunctionality of landscapes. This combination of conceptual tools is evaluated through their application to the case of landscape development in a sub-region of the Algarve, Portugal. In view of this case study it is suggested to complement the Institutions of Sustainability framework: case and transaction specific contextual factors should be included. The paper suggests to look at cross-jurisdictional agency features, cross-function, -transaction and -institutional commonalities, and interconnections as well as to include a dynamic dimension of institutional and physical time lags governing human-ecosystem relations.