On the challenges of civic engagement in the mobility transition - A conceptual analysis of the linkages between car dependence and collective action

In complex transition processes, such as the mobility transition, active citizens have the power to change and to demand change of the incumbent mobility system. For individuals, a substantial challenge lies in breaking up and transforming dominant, unsustainable practices and structures in place. Shifting consumption patterns and routines can contribute to changing such practices, but in democratic societies in particular, stronger levers lie in collective, political participation processes: Individuals can partake by electing representatives who can challenge the car-centric mobility system, or by engaging in citizen initiatives and protests to back up niche innovations and demand policy changes. However, citizen engagement for a sustainable mobility transition faces several structural challenges rooted in the characteristics of the car-centric mobility system. In this paper, we theorize how these characteristics of the car-centric regime influence psychological processes underlying motivation for collective action participation. Based on the Social Identity Model of Pro-Environmental Action (Fritsche et al., 2018), we highlight how motivational factors like a common social identity, collective efficacy beliefs and ingroup norms and goals develop in relation to the specificities of the context the collective action occurs in. We exemplify how the systemic level interacts with individual, within-actor processes and thereby provide a critical perspective on collective action research in transport. This paper explores and delineates intersections between transition studies and collective action research and sketches an interdisciplinary research agenda to advance our understanding of engagement of citizens in mobility activism. • Links between collective action motivation & characteristics of car-dependent regime. • Power imbalance of regime-sustaining actors and transformative citizen-led action. • Motornormativity & apolitical framing of mobility as obstacles to problem awareness. • Collective efficacy beliefs as contingent on perceptions of actor constellations. • Complexity of exnovation processes hampers common goal formation & advocacy.