ABSTRACT
We begin this chapter (and Part II of this book) by exploring the origins of androcentrism and ethnocentrism in the built environment. We build on the bridging concepts and theory introduced in Part I, adding to this an understanding of the cultural constructions underpinning men’s and women’s engagement with the built environment. Alongside questions of androcentrism ‘by design’ we also explore the legacy of neo-liberalism with respect to a politically motivated language of market competition, individual ‘choice’ and fiscal prudence. This discussion is framed from the outset by an understanding of multiple, intersecting infrastructures of daily life alongside a feminist critique of the narrow definition and prioritisation of ‘care-less’ competitiveness (Jarvis 2007a). In Chapter 1 we introduced the physical manifestation of highly unequal access to networked infrastructures, pointing to the image Graham and Marvin (2001: 7) present of electric power lines that rip through poor towns and villages of the global south without serving any of the people who live in their shadow. In this chapter we move beyond this understanding of ‘engineered’ infrastructures to acknowledge a variety of hugely significant but neglected, less visible, highly gendered infrastructures of constraint, including, for example, cultural expectations, guilt, love and obligation. We consider the way persistent inequalities are reproduced by the
Learning objectives
• to think about the concept of infrastructure as being more than material • to critically examine the way cities are shaped by gendered assumptions
in the design and management of the built environment • to identify multiple intersecting urban infrastructures and appreciate
their gendered distribution and cultural role
uneven distribution and gendered cultural associations of multiple infrastructures underpinning everyday routines and practices, historically and geographically. We point to feminist research and methods which expose the gendered cultural barriers influencing the acceptability, respectability and use of urban amenities and resources (such as transport, childcare, sports and recreation). This discussion indicates that proximity and availability alone are not sufficient to determine whether individuals have equal access to publicly funded amenities. We illustrate this point through a number of case studies on domestic architecture, cycling and mental maps of fear. We conclude the chapter with accounts of a growing ‘care deficit’, suggesting that measuring progress in terms of GDP (as discussed in Chapter 1) systematically exploits and diminishes those unpaid activities and caring values most commonly ascribed to women, or to men and marginalised groups who adopt or find themselves cast in ‘feminine’caring roles.
Travel to any city in India and you will find two common images: women lining up with pots of various shapes and sizes waiting for water; and men and children defecating in the open (women have to do this under cover of darkness). The basic services of clean water and sanitation have still to reach millions of people in India even as it boasts of an accelerating rate of economic growth.
