Mobility practices in the UNESCO Biosphere Reserve Entlebuch: Application of social practice theory to everyday household mobility in a rural area of Switzerland

Abstract

To reach the Sustainable Development Goals of sustainable consumption and combatting climate change as set out in the Agenda 2030, mobility patterns of households must become more sustainable. As a designated UNESCO Biosphere Reserve, the rural region of Entlebuch has committed to reaching these goals. To achieve a transition towards environmentally friendly mobility patterns, research around behaviour change frequently adopts an individualistic approach. This approach can however be criticised for overemphasising the sovereignty and rationality of consumers and assuming that values always translate into actual behaviour. Social practice theory provides an alternative approach by focussing not on individuals and their choices but on the practices they adopt. This turning away from the individual and conceptualising mobility as a practice leaves however little room for the agency and reflexivity of individuals in their practices. This thesis tries to address this lacuna by investigating motivations as part of a practice. By analysing the practices of driving, taking public transport, cycling and walking as well as the practices around the transport purposes, namely commuting, shopping and pursuing leisure activities, this thesis accounts for the embeddedness of mobility in everyday life. Through conducting semi-structured interviews with residents of the UNESCO Biosphere Reserve Entlebuch (UBE), this thesis analysed how mobility practices of households of the UBE are configured, how individuals justify their mobility practices in different contexts, and how environmentally friendly they perceive their mobility practices to be. The frequent car use, as well as the mobility confined mostly to the region, are characteristic of the mobility practices of residents of the UBE. The thesis was able to show that mobility practices are configured and motivated differently depending on the purpose they are used for. Dominant motivations for performing mobility practices in a certain way revolve around associated meanings, such as flexibility, convenience, safety, privacy or degree of relaxation. Especially the connectedness to the region and the strong sense of community in the UBE have a positive influence on the environmental friendliness of mobility. The frequent desire to not spent a lot of time on mobility leads to either shorter distances travelled or more frequent car use. Material motivations, such as available infrastructure and alternatives, are a second type of motivation, which were found to be more relevant in the rural area of the UBE than in urban contexts. Lastly, spatiotemporal motivations determine the way a practice is performed. In the UBE, the regional mobility is more car dominated than the local or supra-regional mobility. Environmental concerns play only a minor role in how mobility practices are performed because of the strong necessity associated with being mobile. These findings highlight the importance of considering the embeddedness of mobility practices and going beyond the dominant research focus on car use and commuting. This will not only help to understand the challenges of shifting to more sustainable means of transport in different situations but also why people are mobile in the first place and the potential for avoiding being mobile. Investigating these challenges and potentials can be achieved by analysing practices around transport purposes and the motivations associated with them, which will contribute to a transition towards more environmentally friendly mobility practices.