Navigating value dynamics through daily work

Abstract

Energy transition goes beyond technological substitution to involve changes in human values. To steer value shifts toward desired directions, it is important to understand what individual actor can do. While scholarship has explained general mechanisms of value change, far less is known about how individuals participate in micro value dynamics and shape these transformations. This study addresses this gap by examining how individual lithium battery researchers navigate value tensions in practice, centering on their value beliefs and value practices. Based on interviews with fifteen experienced researchers, the findings reveal that value dynamics in energy transition unfold through recursive dynamics between structured value landscapes and distributed navigation practices. Researchers inhabit possibility spaces shaped by material constraints, institutional requirements, and societal expectations, yet reshape these landscapes through translation, negotiation, positioning, and projection practices. The study argues that desired value change is not merely a shift toward isolated, fixed values but requires cultivating mutualistic relations between individual actors and evolving value landscapes. For the governance of the low-carbon energy transition, this perspective suggests effective interventions should focus more on enhancing the generative capacity of value landscapes, in addition to prescribing specific outcomes.