Abstract
This paper explores how the European Commission promotes the concept of Sustainable Urban Mobility Planning (SUMP) among European cities. Despite the strong uptake of the SUMP concept, mobility-related problems persist in European municipalities. Linking theoretical approaches to understand the diffusion of policies with empirical findings from working with cities in the SUMP context, this article explores channels of policy diffusion and investigates shortcomings related to the respective approaches. Studies on the diffusion, the transfer and the convergence of policies identify formal hierarchy, coercion, competition, learning and networking, and the diffusion of international norms as channels for policy transfer. The findings which are presented in this paper are twofold: First, the paper finds evidence that the Commission takes different roles and uses all mechanisms in parallel, albeit with different intensity. It concludes that the approaches to explain policy diffusion are not competing or mutually exclusive but are applied by the same actor to address different aspects of a policy field, or to reach out to different actors. Second, the article provides first evidence of factors that limit the mechanisms’ abilities to directly influence urban mobility systems and mobility behaviour.
Highlights
Urban areas are attracting more and more people
Eltis facilitates the exchange of information, knowledge and experience on sustainable urban mobility planning and hosts the Sustainable Urban Mobility Planning (SUMP) guidelines, which were developed through a network of mobility experts, The European Commission launched and co-funds the CIVITAS city network, which is dedicated to the promotion of cleaner and better urban mobility systems [41]
Applying the policy transfer and diffusion framework to the field of urban mobility in the EU has shown that, despite the incomplete institutionalisation of a European Urban Mobility Policy [28], the European Commission actively promotes the diffusion of sustainable urban mobility planning practices in European municipalities
Summary
Urban areas are attracting more and more people. In 2018, 74% of all Europeans lived in towns and cities, and this share is expected to increase over the coming decades [1]. It derives and briefly describes key mechanisms—formal hierarchy, coercion, competition, networking, and norm diffusion—and links these findings to empirical data on mobility planning in the EU. The paper links key mechanisms of policy diffusion and policy transfer, which were derived from a review of case examples (e.g., on energy policy) and existing review articles e.g., [6,8] to the findings of the SUMPs Up project evaluation. Policy outcomes—i.e., the implementation of sustainable urban mobility measures or policy impacts—such as changes in modal shares, noise levels, or greenhouse gas emissions, are only indirectly related to the diffusion of the SUMP concept and shaped through a variety. The available empirical data may open lines of reasoning and give a first orientation but are far from providing systemic and generalisable evidence for explaining the latter dimensions of policy change
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