Navigating Detours in the Mobility Transition

This book offers a comprehensive diagnosis of the current situation of mobility policies and an examination of potential actions to promote sustainable mobility by changing practices and challenging political decision-makers. What if the real challenge of decarbonising mobility lay somewhere other than where we thought? Faced with the climate emergency, the transition is still largely treated as a matter of technology, without questioning the constant increase in travel, distances covered, and speed. Worse still, this focus on decarbonisation pushes into the background the other ecological and social challenges posed by our mobility system, including biodiversity collapse, the exponential consumption of space and materials, and widening inequalities. Bringing together around sixty international specialists in the social sciences, this book turns the perspective on its head. It shows that the shift towards sustainable mobility requires, first and foremost, a profound transformation of our lifestyles, our territories and, consequently, our public policies and social norms. Why do we remain so dependent on the car? How can we reconcile freedom, social justice, and quality of life with ecological imperatives? By providing an unprecedented overview of scientific knowledge and possible courses of action, this book demonstrates that more restrained forms of mobility can also offer greater freedom, fairness, and desirability. It is an essential reference for understanding the contemporary challenges of the ecological transition and imagining the mobilities of tomorrow. This project was launched at the initiative of the Forum Vies Mobiles, a French think tank specialising in mobility, whose aim is to respond to citizens’ aspirations while moving beyond a carbon-based mobility system.