Topic “Mobility”
Feb 9th, 2009 | By Kurt Möser | Category: Mobility, Topics
Mobility is a polarizing subject that invites social commentary and stimulates political controversy. On one hand it is highly valued by members of industrialized Western societies who devote considerable social energy (and much primary energy) to develop and maintain. On the other hand the economic and social costs of mobility have come into focus as well as the risks connected with it. Social and physical mobility are overlapping concepts and their interchangability may be confusing yet it can be rewarding to explore the different strata and facets of this field. Today collective and individual mobility systems need to be critically assessed from different points of view: their impact on society, the way they relate to and structure urban spaces, their power to shape landscapes, their redefinition of time and space, their formatting of desires, emotions or indeed the body itself. Questions of dealing with the trends and development vectors of mobility have to be addressed. As the largest socio-technological system (and as some claim the most deadly), individual mobility demands considerable methodological consideration. In past research approaches, identifying mobility merely with transport proved to be inadequate in the context of the complexity of this subject. An artefact-centered history of technology faces a similar problem even if the individual mobility system is interpreted as an objectification of social developments. If, for instance, the the cultural technique of balancing, required for cycling, flying or canoeing, is to be understood, and its origins explained, a number of different fields of knowledge have to be activated. To understand how phenomena like these are perceived and described, different forms of analysis need to be considered. Thus mobility requires a truly interdisciplinary approach as well as an appropriately wide range of methods. We are convinced that in order to come to terms with this field it is desirable to re-open research, to find new angles of looking at new aspects, to excavate new sources. We are inviting an open discussion and a creative approach to explore the range of mobility in as many aspects as possible.
Bezogen auf meinen Kommentar zum Topic “Spatial Cybernetics” wollte ich auf die Verbindung dieses Topic mit dem von “Mobility” hinweisen. Denn Mobilität in den hier dargelegten Aspekten und ‘Kybernetik der modernen Räume’ (um spatial cybernetics von seinem gemeinten Sinn her zu übersetzen) hängen eng miteinander zusammen: Mobilität in modernen (und post-modernen) Gesellschaften erzeugt zu einem wesentlichen Teil die feedback- und feedforward-Schleifen, von denen in spacial cybernetics die Rede sein soll.
Als Journalist mit langjähriger Berufspraxis in den Themenbereichen Mobilität und Automobilität bin ich an einem Topic Mobility im e-journal natürlich höchst interessiert. “Das ganze Unglück der Menschen rührt allein daher, dass sie nicht ruhig in einem Zimmer zu verbleiben vermögen”, konstatierte schon Blaise Pascal. Ob es uns gefällt oder nicht: Mobilität ist ein unumstössliches Grundbedürfnis, das natürlich einer Diskussion im Kontext der von Kurt Möser beschriebenen Problemstellungen bedarf. Die positiven Aspekte der Mobilität dürfen bei aller kritischen Auseinandersetzung aber nicht in den Hintergrund gedrängt werde. Trendfortscher Matthias Horx, der in der Mobilität einen Megatrend des 21. Jahrhunderts sieht, sagt zurecht: “Mobilität ist immer auch ein Versprecher größerer Autonomie.”