ABSTRACT
Inclusive urban development is a concept that has shaped the United Nations Agenda 2030 for Sustainable Development. It ties inclusivity to inequality in global agendas for urban development and demonstrates the growing influence of critical analysis and theorisations of urban diversity following on decades of work on gender and intersectionality studies and the ever increasing recognition of feminist perspectives. This chapter outlines how current thinking on diversity and intersectionality challenges existing practices of urban development, because they remain wedded to a particular concept of a homogeneous community. The chapter argues for the recognition of the diverse needs and aspirations of different urban residents as an engine for just and inclusive urban development and explores innovative methodologies to achieve it. This chapter introduces the papers in the book which explore how diversity in terms of gender, class, race and ethnicity, citizenship status, age, ability, religion, and sexuality is taken (or not) into account and approached in the planning and implementation of development policy and interventions in lower-income urban areas. The book proposes an intersectionality approach as a means to account for the situated experiences of diverse individuals and social groups, that experience the intersection of different structural drivers of exclusion in unique and situated ways.
