01624750

Component

The unsustainable urban transportation system drives researchers and practitioners to consider that how ecological system and human society can remain diverse and productive. Sustainable transportation policies have been implemented in cities across the world, but their effectiveness depends on people's attitudes towards them. The Framework For Strategic Sustainable Development (FSSD) has been successfully applied to transform urban transportation systems towards sustainability in Swedish cities. However, cultural differences should be taken into consideration before the FSSD is transferred to the Chinese municipalities. Thus, the authors conducted a qualitative research to explore whether there are significant distinctions between the Swedish and Chinese people's attitudes towards sustainability and sustainable transportation policies. The results show that Swedish people have a better understanding of the social aspects of sustainability. Cultural difference is revealed to be a more important factor than current transportation problems influencing attitude towards sustainable transportation policies. Since sustainable development requires a strategic vision of what should be achieved, the tradition of tactical orientation becomes a barrier to implementing sustainable transportation policies in China. Moreover, Swedish people incline to make self-motivated changes while Chinese people prefer a strong government intervention to push forward the transformation towards sustainable transportation systems. It may be partly affected by the collectivist society which exerts enormous pressure on Chinese people. It suggests that Chinese policy-makers should draw close attention to guide the public to understand what benefits they could derive from a sustainable transportation policy and to make self-motivated changes.

This paper was sponsored by TRB committee ADD40 Standing Committee on Transportation and Sustainability. Alternate title: Do Cultural Differences Matter? Comparison Between Swedish and Chinese Attitudes Toward Sustainable Transportation Policies

01618707

17-02958

English

17p

2017

Transportation Research Board 96th Annual Meeting

Digital/other

Figures; References; Tables

Attitudes; Culture (Social sciences); Social factors; Sustainable transportation; Transportation policy

China; Sweden

Environment; Policy; Society; Transportation (General)

Transportation Research Board Annual Meeting 2017 Paper #17-02958

TRIS, TRB, ATRI

Dec 8 2016 11:06AM