Putting the Power in ‘Socio-Technical Regimes’ – E-Mobility Transition in China as Political Process

Abstract

A mobility low-carbon transition is a key issue both socially and for mobilities research. The multi-level perspective (MLP) is justifiably a leading approach in such research, with important connections to high-profile socio-technical systemic analyses within the mobilities paradigm. The paper explores the key contributions that a Foucauldianinspired cultural political economy offers, going beyond central problems with the MLP, specifically regarding: a productive concept of power that affords analysis of the qualitatively novel and dynamic process of transition; and the incorporation of the exogenous 'landscape' into the analysis. This move thus resonates with growing calls for attention to power dynamics in mobilities research and a 'structural' turn. In making this case, we deploy the key case study of contemporary efforts towards mobility transition in China. This not only sets out more starkly the importance of MLP's gaps but also provides an empirical case to illustrate, albeit in the form of informed speculation, possible routes to low-carbon urban mobility transition and the inseparability from broader qualitative power transitions at multiple scales, including the global.

From “living lab” to strategic action field: Bringing together energy, mobility, and Information Technology in Germany

“…A number of scholars have criticized the MLP for lacking a systematic and explicit "account for power, agency and general political economy phenomena" [32: 265]. Geels and others have addressed the issues of power and agency, among other criticisms, in their recent work [33][34][35]. However, most MLP-studies still focus on dynamics and interactions between relatively disembodied niches and regimes -not on socially skilled actors and their concrete actions.…”

Mobility intersections: social research, social futures

“…It showcases pioneering theoretical developments/syntheses between mobilities research and a diverse range of adjacent theoretical perspectives. Relevant fields include: science and technology studies and non-representational theory (Barad 2007;Thrift 2007); theories of risk and cosmopolitanism (Beck 2006;Beck et al 2013;Tyfield and Blok, this issue); securitization (Packer 2008;Adey 2009;Anderson 2010;Aradau 2004, and this issue;Amoore 2006); transition theory (Geels 2002;Geels et al 2013;Kanger and Schot, this issue;Sheller 2011;Tyfield 2014); disability studies (Sawchuk 2014; Parent, this issue; Goggin, this issue); urban studies (Hall and Smith 2015 and this issue;Middleton 2010;Brenner and Schmid 2015); design research (Galloway et al 2004, Ehn 2008, Simonsen et al 2010, Kimbell 2011, Jensen 2013, and this issue); feminist theories of space and gendered mobilities (Kaplan 1996;Massey 1994;McDowell 2013;Murray et al, this issue). How can intersections, syntheses, and frictions between mobilities research and these adjacent theoretical perspectives (and others besides) lead to deeper and more useful insights into contemporary forms of life that inform theoretical, methodological, epistemological and critical, creative future-making moves in the social sciences and beyond?…”

‘Meet the New Boss … Same as the Old boss?’ Technology, toil and tension in the agrofuel frontier

“…By contrast, where power in such systems is understood in broadly Foucauldian terms as productive, strategic and relational, a different picture emerges without the need to repudiate the analytical dividends of the systemic perspective (Tyfield, ). Here, then, the system is dynamically co‐produced by and with emerging forms of power relation that are themselves in turn shaped, enabled and constrained by both the incumbent and emerging systems.…”