From wheels to systems: Characterizing automobility as technosphere

Automobility’s global role in providing mobility services but with adverse impacts on climate change and land use makes it a critical topic at a planetary scale. So far the role of cars has been mostly addressed from a techno-economic perspective, with complementary but fragmented insights from other social sciences. We provide evidence that understanding automobility as a sub-system of the technosphere compromising human-made artifacts and structures with impacts at planetary scale enables investigations from a systems perspective. Our empirically grounded characterization of causal loops provides insights on intervention points guiding co-evolutionary trajectories between automobility, societies, and local and planetary dynamics along different temporal and spatial scales. We systematically draw on existing modeling approaches for outlining how to model automobility as technosphere in a reduced form. We conclude that policies, measures and cultural shifts should be systematically evaluated according to their impact on car-dependent systems. Our approach offers novel insights for reorienting automobility toward pathways consistent with low planetary impact and high well-being.

Authors

Institutions

Publication Details

Journal
The Anthropocene Review
Published
2026-10-08
DOI
https://doi.org/10.1177/20530196261472905
Primary Topic
Sustainability and Climate Change Governance
Type
article
Field-Weighted Citation Impact
0.00
Controls
|||
ALL TIME
JAN
FEB
MAR
APR
MAY
JUN
JUL
AUG
SEP
OCT
article

From wheels to systems: Characterizing automobility as technosphere

Felix Wagner, Florian Nachtigall, Kostas Mouratidis, Adam Millard‐Ball et al.
The Anthropocene Review
Sustainability and Climate Change Governance
article

From wheels to systems: Characterizing automobility as technosphere

Felix Wagner, Florian Nachtigall, Kostas Mouratidis, Adam Millard‐Ball, A. Katharina Keil, Aimée Aguilar Jaber, Sonia Yeh, Dominik Wiedenhofer, Giulio Mattioli, Georgia Pozoukidou, Marlin Arnz, Vincent Viguié, Galit Cohen‐Blankshtain, Debbie Hopkins, Henrike Rau, Andrea Broaddus, Sebastian Bamberg, Gesine A. Steudle, Caroline Zimm, Charlie Wilson, Aneeque Javaid, Eric J. Miller, Malte Vogl, Felix Creutzig, Anjali Ramakrishnan, Mark Andor, Stefan Gössling, Sarah Wolf, Peter Wells, J. Renn, Elisabeth Dütschke
article en

Abstract

Automobility’s global role in providing mobility services but with adverse impacts on climate change and land use makes it a critical topic at a planetary scale. So far the role of cars has been mostly addressed from a techno-economic perspective, with complementary but fragmented insights from other social sciences. We provide evidence that understanding automobility as a sub-system of the technosphere compromising human-made artifacts and structures with impacts at planetary scale enables investigations from a systems perspective. Our empirically grounded characterization of causal loops provides insights on intervention points guiding co-evolutionary trajectories between automobility, societies, and local and planetary dynamics along different temporal and spatial scales. We systematically draw on existing modeling approaches for outlining how to model automobility as technosphere in a reduced form. We conclude that policies, measures and cultural shifts should be systematically evaluated according to their impact on car-dependent systems. Our approach offers novel insights for reorienting automobility toward pathways consistent with low planetary impact and high well-being.

The Anthropocene Review
Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (DE), University of Copenhagen (DK), International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (AT), RWI – Leibniz Institute for Economic Research (DE), University of California, Los Angeles (US), University of Sussex (GB), University of Toronto (CA), TU Dortmund University (DE), Hochschule Bielefeld (DE), Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (GR), Linnaeus University (SE), University of Oxford (GB), CIRED (FR), Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History (DE), Technische Universität Berlin (DE), San Jose State University (US), Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (DE), Chalmers University of Technology (SE), Cardiff University (GB), Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München (DE), University of Gothenburg (SE), Ruhr University Bochum (DE), BOKU University (AT), University of Lausanne (CH)
Openalex Percentile: Top 15%
Sustainability and Climate Change Governance
DOIOpen Access PDFOpenAlex
AI Navigator

Ask Laika to Summarize, Analyze, and Connect papers live on the map.

Summarize Papers & Methodologies

Extract key findings, datasets, and comparative methods across publications.

Benchmark Rankings & Visual Analytics

Rank top research institutions, authors, funders, topics, and journals by Field-Weighted Citation Impact (FWCI) and paper volume with instant charts.

Connect Distant Disciplines

Bridge topological clusters on the map to find hidden collaborative intersections.