Capital endowments: Explaining energy citizenship using Bourdieu's forms of capital

Forms of energy citizenship include behaviors among citizens who choose to materially invest in renewable technologies, which aligns with the concept of material energy citizenship. Furthermore, citizens also join energy communities, vote, protest, openly discuss, express their rights and responsibilities, and campaign based on their preferences around energy, which formulate communicative energy citizenship. Although many studies examine and describe energy citizenship, few examine the factors that contribute to citizenship behaviors. Understanding how various forms of capital relate to different manifestations of energy citizenship can shed light on factors that obstruct the transition to renewable energy. Therefore, to mitigate these obstacles, we ask how energy citizenship can be stimulated by the forms of capital, which are introduced by Pierre Bourdieu to promote the use and acceptance of renewable energy. To answer this question, we perform content analysis of in-depth interviews conducted with residents from wind turbine-adjacent neighborhoods in the Netherlands. We examine how people's economic, cultural, and social capital may encourage them to move from more passive participation in energy systems to more active forms. The findings reveal complex interactions that are at play between and within the types of capitals and energy citizenship.