From Transport History to History of Sustainable Mobility

The chapter provides a synthetic review on how mobility and transport historians have treated the history of the emergence of automotive sustainable alternative technologies in Europe and the US. Historical literature on the diffusion of sustainable automotive technologies has grown exponentially in the last two decades. The chapter offers an interesting perspective on the new approaches aiming at underlining the intertwining of political, economic, and cultural variables influencing sectoral technological trajectories in Europe. The chapter, by relying on the Italy case, also suggests that specific attention needs to be paid to the contribution of relevant experts’ communities and their relation with the political decision-making process and to the shifting positions of the multiple voices in the debate on technological options at the light of both industrial policy options and the peculiar geopolitical situation of Italy.