Spatial variability of soils in the landscape and how this variability is represented by soil maps and portrayed in map unit descriptions are critical for assessing many of today's pressing environmental concerns. Traditional concepts used in mapping, naming, defining and correlating map units need to be redirected from a use or purpose bias to one that uses soil properties as the basis for correlation. Map unit delineations need to represent real segments of the landscape by capturing discrete soil patterns that function as workable stratifications of the landscape and provide detailed soils information for use in environmental assessment. An estimate of the proportion of map unit components can be made with quantifiable uncertainty bounds. By grouping soils into response classes, minor soil components, important to understanding the ecology of landscape and assessing environmental concerns, can be retained in regional-scale data bases. To meet the need for global-scale assessments, a soil and landscape attribute based framework is proposed.