Presentation
This Study, produced by the Institut Mobilités en Transition (IMT) in collaboration with IDDRI, proposes an approach to the social pact for mobility, as well as an analytical framework for assessing the risks of controversy, opposition and setback, in order to better construct and manage future transitional mobility policies. By providing sociological and political analytical grids and putting them into dialogue with the technical and economic analysis, this approach aims to provide a richer and finer analysis, and thus strengthen the capacity to implement the ecological transition and contribute to the development of a fairer mobility system.
Key Messages
- Mobility is the keystone of lifestyles and of a social contract based on the ability to get around easily. As such, it is a politically and socially sensitive issue. Therefore, a transition project that does a poor job of assessing its impact and is ill-conceived in these respects runs the risk of being controversial, contested and hindered.
- Better anticipating these risks and building the legitimacy of transition policies requires specific work, often under-investigated today, combining a diversity of analyses in the human and social sciences. This means broadening the perspective beyond the analysis of the public policy concerned.
- The social and political context in which a policy proposal is made—existing conflicts and divisions, unfulfilled promises by the State, distrust of representatives—plays a decisive role in the reception, mobilization and interpretation of this policy. It is with this in mind that we are drawing on our work on the social contract and proposing to re-use the concept of the “Mobility Pact”, in order to gain a better understanding of what mobility represents in the lives of social groups and the organization of society—which ultimately determines its political sensitivity. Using sociological and political analytical grids to put them into dialogue with technical and economic analysis, this approach aims to provide a richer and more refined analysis. Its ambition is to strengthen the capacity to implement the ecological transition and to contribute to the development of a fairer mobility system.
- This Study provides an analysis grid for carrying out social impact studies ahead of a mobility policy project. It combines several layers dealing with the challenges of designing the system; the actual conditions of its deployment; the context of interpretation and perception; the factors undermining the mobility pact; and the place and role of citizen participation.
- We outline a work agenda based on the application of this grid to several case studies (renewal of the tax doctrine on road transport, impacts of ETS 2 and redistribution of the Social Climate Fund, deployment of express road services).
Read the Study online on IMT's website (in French)
Also read the related blog post (in French)
