Speaker: Håvard Haarstad, University of Bergen, Norway
Discussant: Vanessa Castán Broto, University Sheffield, UK
Chair: Zack Taylor, University of Western Ontario, Canada

There appears to be a growing political and populist backlash against climate-related policies across Europe and North America. I this talk I argue that this can be read as a regional backlash against the urban sustainability agenda. This agenda has become hegemonic in both policy and academic circles, with emphasis on liveability, walkability, public transport, and green spaces. Arguably, this agenda has been overly focused on resolving climate and energy challenges in urban cores, overlooking regional implications. While many cities have been quite successful in mitigating climate change and environmental problems, this urban-centric focus has arguably had a number of political-economic effects negatively affecting the peri-urban region. Road tolls, infrastructure investments and parking restrictions in cities are seen to affect peri-urban residents disproportionally. And this is exacerbated by a perceived cultural ‘war’ against private cars. My own home region of Bergen and other European cases will be used to illustrate these dynamics.

Right-wing populist tendencies have multiple and complicated root causes. Yet, in closing, I want to reflect on the role that the urban sustainability agenda, which our academic community has been part of advancing, may have played in increasing urban-regional polarisation and populist backlash. How can we rethink urban-regional sustainability transitions in less polarising ways?

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