Lifestyle mobilities and urban environmental degradation: evidence from China

Abstract

Building on the intersection of lifestyle mobilities, changing environments and climates and practice theories, this paper explores how lifestyle mobilities are mobilised in response to the pervasive environmental and climatic stress in China. Grounded in an ethnographic study conducted in a lifestyle destination with lifestyle travellers moored across multiple domestic nature-based destinations, this paper finds that the motivations towards lifestyle mobility are rooted in how people relate their health and desired ways of life with the natural environment through tourism practices, everyday practices at original homes and destinations, and mobility practices. Consistent movements of human bodies, objects and skills enable lifestyle travellers to perceive and understand environmental pollution and adapt to different climates. Rather than focussing on identity construction or the sense of belonging, we provide a different way to conceptualise lifestyle mobilities by appreciating the sensitivity, reflexivity and adaptability that an emerging Chinese mobile population develops when living with environmental crises, climate change and changing climates across various indoor and outdoor spaces. This paper reflects on the potential of intersecting practice theories with mobilities paradigm and pollution perception studies and suggests policy intervention on lifestyle mobilities in a rapidly industrialising and highly mobile era.

Keywords:

• Lifestyle mobility
• environmental degradation
• climate adaptation
• social practice theory
• China

Acknowledgements

This paper forms the basis of a PhD dissertation by Liu Qi, and the broader project and paper development was supported by the contributions of Dr Alison Browne (main supervisor) and Prof Deljana Iossifova (co-supervisor). The authors are grateful to the interviewees for sharing their experiences. We also appreciate the inspiring comments from the anonymous reviewers.

Author contributions

Qi Liu: conceptualisation, methodology, investigation, formal analysis and writing – original draft; Alison Browne: conceptualisation, methodology, formal analysis, writing – review & editing and supervision.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 WeChat is the most common instant communication app amongst Chinese people.

2 The Chinese word gouqie means compromising to short-term interests. Since 2016, gouqie has become widely spread on social media due to the lyrics written by a Chinese-American composer who encouraged the youth to go beyond daily trivialities (i.e. avoid gouqie) and explore the world with spiritual pursuit.

3 In the 1950s, China’s Huai River Policy set the Heating Line that divided the country in two with different infrastructural and institutionalised access to heating; its legacies have been interwoven with the fabrics of everyday life until today (Browne, Petrova, and Brockett 2018).