The Electric Car and the Burdens of Culture, Political Economy and History

Ernie Yanarella, Director, Environment Studies Program

Key Question
Why did the gasoline-powered, internal combustion engine win out over the electric motor-driven car in the race for pre-eminence as the standard for private vehicle transportation in the United States in the first two decades of the Automobile Age?
Was the victory of the gasoline fueled automobile inevitable? Was it a conspiracy?

What Does the Historical Evidence Suggest?

Not foreordained Early success of electric-powered automobile, taxi, and truck Early preference over gas-fueled automobile, particularly in towns and cities

The Electric Vehicles Liabilities

The electric automobile's Achilles' heel--its battery It could not be fast and go far simultaneously The separate spheres dichotomy broke down

 The gendered element of the separate spheres idea undercut its more neutral rendering The Pluto effect came to favor the gasoline car

 A variety of factors came to advantage the gasoline propelled auto as the single-car family vehicle for in-town and long-distance excursions

But
Technology not a monolithic process--it is the sum of technical, social, political, economic, and value decisions and choices For a time, steam, gasoline, and electric vehicles competed in a variety of contexts and many enthusiasts for one or the other expected that a range of variants would survive the process of technological stabilization

Also
A kind of techno-corporate complex shaping and dominating major public policy realms-the auto-highway-petroleum-rubber-national defense complexdid begin to emerge and increasingly shaped the evolution of the American transportation system The scaling up and expansion of the gaspowered automobile transportation system had vast consequences

The Impact of Culture, Technology, and Political Economy

The predominance of consumer preferences embedded in deeper American cultural values for private automobile transportation, touring or excursion, and individual over mass transportation Abetted by the gathering clout of the emergent autohighway-petroleum-rubber complex in consolidating its hold over the auto marketplace and wider transportation field, and Its success in using its tightening political and financial grip to buy up, tear down or convert mass electrified transport into gas-powered, rubber tired bus lines and taxis that fitted into its socio-technical mold and profit-oriented interests

The Twin Legacy of 1890-1928

We are now the inheritors of these multiple decisions and choices and the options they closed off just as we are caught up in the web of dependencies, burdens, and risks.

 They have:
shaped our urban landuse patterns and designs; wedded us to the power and interests, twists and turns, changing fortunes and compulsions of Big Oil, the leading automakers, OPEC, and the Middle East

 Contributed to heating up the earth through the noxious chemical and fumes being vaulted into the air The rise and fall of the EV-1--the "car that could"--and its chosen fate must be understood against this background and its triple burdens that have shaped that fateful choice