E-mobility in Germany: White hope for a sustainable development or Fig leaf for particular interests?

The opportunities and limitations of electrically driven mobility are currently widely discussed in public debates on vehicles and future transport. E-mobility has by and large been communicated in the context of sustainable mobility and its central idea is an urban e-car. Questioning the hype for this technology, this paper presents the development of the hegemonic discourse of e-mobility focusing on the actors involved. The study is based on a media analysis of selected German print media. The various phases of the e-mobility discourse were reconstructed by the detailed study of thematic focuses brought about by various actors such as politicians, electric supply companies and traditional automotive industry, and by the temporal distribution of the articles dealing with e-mobility. In addition the actor configuration is clarified by reference to the statements of the actors in the articles. The phases in the e-mobility discourse can be explained by a certain constellation of actors and how they manage to enforce their claims and interests. While the government plays a prominent role in the current development of the e-mobility discourse, the change of the automobile industry's common position towards the electric vehicle and the rising interests of the power supply industry also play an important role. Finally, the paper reveals the internal and external driving forces of the e-mobility discourse and evaluates whether it is promoted in a sustainable way.

► We made an actor-centred discourse analysis of the recent e-mobility hype.
► We compared the recent discourse with the one in the 1990s.
► We found similarities and differences of both discourses.
► We identified a new quality of the recent discourse as a result of a different actors figuration.