9
Both scenarios called for the government to play a significant role in order to bring
them about.
Figure 2.
Public Transport
Scenario
Private Transport
scenario
Society
•
Invest Public transport
infrastructure
•
Civic right to move around : Oldies
and Poors
•
Compact city policy
•
Busy city centre with eye spies
•
Abandonment of many rural
agricultural communities
•
Virtual accessibility by ICT
•
People dwells dispatched
•
self responsibility
•
New life style
•
Income disparity widen
•
Local communities go bankruptcy
•
Small, medium towns cease public
transport services
CO2
•
Public transport system reduces
CO2
•
EV dominates market, reduces CO2
Economy
•
Regulation and redistribution
•
Low growth
•
Gov’t pour big R&D money to EV
techs and dissemination
•
High growth, high logistic cost
Urban Mobility 2040
@
Dr. Hironori Kato
Univ. of Tokyo
This was an academic work trying to evoke civic discussion. We therefore tried to
write stories that were easy to read, with lots of illustrations. In that regard, we
succeeded: today we see some activity that refers to this scenario work, suggesting
that it has been read and noticed. But, wait a minute: from the scenario practitioners’
viewpoint, there is a weakness in the framework of this study.
The “Urban Mobility 2040” anticipates that problems will resolve themselves once
the government notices that they exist, and can put its policies into effect. The
Japanese government will exercise its masterful organising force, marshalling
scientific and engineering enterprise to transform society. Indeed, this scenario work
did communicate well with the Japanese government and other public sector
organizations specializing in the urban planning. However, what then? Can we
believe that governments will always do fine? That government has never failed?
To get to grips with this question, I must introduce another scenario.
2.5. China: when governments go wrong
During the last ten years I have performed many scenario exercises relating to country
risk analysis, particularly with regards to developing countries. There has been a
good demand for this kind of work both from private and public organizations.
When discussing the future of certain developing countries, unstable domestic politics
and/or malfunctioning governments very often come up as key uncertainty. For
example, in 2006/07 I performed a scenario study on China for a Japanese research
institute, a not-for profit organisation (NPO). The aim of the work was to ignite a
conversation between Chinese and Japanese experts on energy saving issues.
10
In this scenario work we pointed out that the success of China’s drive for an energy-
saving society was conditional on the state of the Chinese domestic economy. A
global economic downswing could happen any time, and would hit hard the Chinese
economic boom, which for many people then (as now) appeared unstoppable. ‘China
Scenarios 2007’ provocatively suggested that, if the Chinese government was
incompetent to cope with an international or domestic macroeconomic crisis, the
recession might be prolonged for years to come. Moreover, any recovery might
become steadily more difficult, as China faced the onset of an ageing society, and a
resultant smaller workforce and higher social welfare bills. Economic activity would
plunge, resulting in less energy consumption but also eclipsing in peoples’ minds the
importance of energy saving. The scenario argued that the energy saving mind set is
seeded mainly in city dwellers’ affluent spending behaviour, not among the rural
population in China. This is the message Japanese energy experts wanted to deliver,
outspoken and undimmed. It ought to be noted that this work was finished and
presented before the Lehman Shock in autumn 2008.
Figure 3.
We presented ‘China Scenario 2007” at an international conference in Shanghai
focused on energy conservation. Notable researchers, regulators and business leaders
listened to the scenario. We received many comments and questions from the floor.
Chinese experts wanted us to show the numerical relationship between a
macroeconomic crisis and energy-saving habits, and having anticipated this line of
questioning we were ready to share our research results. A good exchange of views
took place, with Chinese and Japanese thinkers freely speaking their minds to each
other. Later after the conference, we were told that many senior official in the
Chinese government attended our presentation and conversed with energy experts.
China Scenario 2007: Outline
Economic
Growth
‘2008
Beijing
Olympic
‘2010
Shanghai EXPO
Macro Economic
Crisis ?!
Aging weighs on China
.… gradually …
Anchor
Scenario
‘2020
Energy Saving
Giant
@CRIEPI, 2007