Lifestyle mobilities and urban environmental degradation: evidence from China

Abstract

Building on the intersection of lifestyle mobilities, changing environments and climates and practice theories, this paper explores how lifestyle mobilities are mobilised in response to the pervasive environmental and climatic stress in China. Grounded in an ethnographic study conducted in a lifestyle destination with lifestyle travellers moored across multiple domestic nature-based destinations, this paper finds that the motivations towards lifestyle mobility are rooted in how people relate their health and desired ways of life with the natural environment through tourism practices, everyday practices at original homes and destinations, and mobility practices. Consistent movements of human bodies, objects and skills enable lifestyle travellers to perceive and understand environmental pollution and adapt to different climates. Rather than focussing on identity construction or the sense of belonging, we provide a different way to conceptualise lifestyle mobilities by appreciating the sensitivity, reflexivity and adaptability that an emerging Chinese mobile population develops when living with environmental crises, climate change and changing climates across various indoor and outdoor spaces. This paper reflects on the potential of intersecting practice theories with mobilities paradigm and pollution perception studies and suggests policy intervention on lifestyle mobilities in a rapidly industrialising and highly mobile era.