Objective
Traditionally, the social impacts of transport and the effect that this has on social equity and exclusion have been much less well understood and articulated by transport researchers and policy makers than economic and environmental factors. Understanding the relationships between transport disadvantage (financial, temporal, spatial, cultural, physical and cognitive) and how this can contribute to the social exclusion of certain population groups by reducing their ability to participate in life-enhancing opportunities, such as as work, learning, shopping, social networking and cultural and leisure pursuits is clearly an important issue not only for EU member states but also across the developed and developing world. For example, this understanding is necessary for the evaluation of a number of the EU’s strategic policy goals.
In recognition of the importance of these issues, the behavioural and social sciences have developed a growing interest in researching these issues in recent years and there is now a wide range of research which has sought to make the role of transport in enhancing or undermining social equity, inclusion and cohesion, health, well-being and quality of life more explicit and transparent. This work has largely been developed in a parallel rather than integrated fashion, exploiting a number of potentially complementary but hitherto largely discrete theoretical and methodological approaches and is also taking place within different national contexts.
A key priority for this research exchange programme is therefore to:
1. Expose the full diversity of the research which has been already undertaken to in this area to date;
2. Facilitate the exchange of ideas about the various and diverse theoretical concepts and methodological approaches which abound;
3. Develop new hybrid theories and methodologies and test these in different national contexts
4. Identify the applicability and utility of these new perspectives for the development of future policy
Fields of science
Call for proposal
FP7-PEOPLE-2011-IRSES
See other projects for this call
Coordinator
OX1 2JD Oxford
United Kingdom