Australian Planner

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Women in planning in the twenty-first century

Caryl Bosman, Deanna Grant-Smith & Natalie Osborne

To cite this article: Caryl Bosman, Deanna Grant-Smith & Natalie Osborne (2017)
Women in planning in the twenty-first century, Australian Planner, 54:1, 1-5, DOI:
10.1080/07293682.2017.1297321

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AUSTRALIAN PLANNER, 2017
VOL. 54, NO. 1, 1–5
http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/07293682.2017.1297321

Editorial

Women in planning in the twenty-first century

Caryl Bosmana, Deanna Grant-Smithb and Natalie Osborne c

a
School of Environment, Griffith University, Gold Coast, QLD, Australia; bQUT Business School, Queensland University of Technology,
Brisbane, QLD, Australia; cSchool of Environment, Griffith University, Gold Coast, QLD, Australia

ABSTRACT ARTICLE HISTORY

An important part of the feminist planning project is to make visible the many and varied Received 3 January 2017
contributions of women in planning. However, despite the substantial advances of feminist Accepted 16 February 2017
movements, planning education and practice has yet to consistently understand and address
KEYWORDS
the needs of marginalised groups, particularly women, and has struggled to adopt Women in planning; gender;
intersectionality as a fundamental planning concern. This has significant practical and feminist planning; feminism;
political implications. Spatial and kyriarchal power structures create gendered experiences of planning history; gendered
the built environment and the planning and provision of infrastructure and services can have leadership
significant impacts on women’s safety, quality of life and access to opportunities. This special
issue explores the multiple ways that women are the objects and subjects of planning within
structures of power. This editorial positions the contributions in this issue by considering the
extent to which planning has addressed the needs of women. While we cannot trust that
progress in this regard will continue to be linear and cumulative, we find cause, through
these contributions, to celebrate both the legacy and the future of women in planning.

The personal is political, the political is
spatial and the spatial is (inter)personal
‘The personal is political’ has long been a feminist ral-
lying cry. Not only is it an exhortation to action, it chal-
lenges the public/private dichotomy that long rendered
the lives of women invisible and apolitical, and it pos-
itions politics as an everyday endeavour that manifests
itself in the contours of daily existence and in mundane
struggles. Feminist planners and geographers expanded
on this notion by focusing on the spatial dimensions of
both the political and the personal, and how they inter-
act to shape gendered lived experiences and the
material conditions of women (see, e.g. Ahrentzen
2003; Cannella and Manuelito 2008; Fainstein and Ser-
von 2005; Peake and Rieker 2013; Sandercock and For-
syth 1992; Sultana 2010; Sweet and Escalante 2010;
Valentine 2007; Whitzman et al. 2013; Wright 2010a,
2010b). After all,
[p]ower can be a difficult phenomenon to observe but
it gives itself away in space. One of the most visible
ways of exercising power, after all, is to occupy or to
control space; architecture, meanwhile, makes power
legible in material forms. (Tonkiss 2005, 60)
In recent decades, drawing connections between the
personal, the spatial and the political has been an
important project of feminist planners and geogra-
phers, and other urban studies scholars informed by
critical theory. Feminist planning can manifest itself
as a kind of everyday spatial politics, concerned with
what we do, in the places we inhabit, how we allocate
and share resources – including time – how we
encounter each other and The Other, and the subtle
negotiations we engage in to manage what Healey
(1997, 68) calls ‘our coexistence in shared spaces’.
These interactions and experiences, often grounded
in the mundanity of everyday existence, can provide
the fodder for a critical analysis of power and politics,
taking clues from experiences in and of space and place
to inform our understanding of the political machina-
tions affecting material conditions. Ultimately, this
kind of analysis helps us understand the relationships
between the structures that produce and reproduce
the built environment, and the structures that produce
and reproduce social relationships and conditions.
Clara Greed has observed that:
[i]n order to read the game one needs to understand
the relationships between town planning and femin-
ism as two of the most important social movements
which have developed in modern times … [Feminism]
can act as a prism through which one can evaluate the
built environment. It can serve as the driving force for
seeking to change it. (Greed 1994, 6–7)
Indeed, an important part of the feminist planning
project is to make visible the many and varied contri-
butions of women in planning, linking these two social
movements. In 2013, two valuable edited collections
(Peake and Rieker 2013; Whitzman et al. 2013) on gen-
der, justice and cities were published which highlighted
the ongoing gendered gap in planning. Both invited the
next generation of planning practitioners, scholars and
educators to take on the challenge of gender equity and

CONTACT Caryl Bosman c.bosman@griffith.edu.au

© 2017 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
2 C. BOSMAN ET AL.
intersectionality in their practice. This special issue
takes up this call. Commencing with a snapshot of
women planners in Australia by past PIA CEO Kirsty
Kelly, this special issue is structured around three
recurrent themes: planning for women; politics, pres-
ence and intersectionality; and planning by women.
Planning for women: beyond transport and
toilets?
The outcomes of planning can have significant impacts
on women’s safety, quality of life and access to oppor-
tunities. This is particularly evident in the planning and
provision of transport services which construct and
reinforce gender inequality (Buiten 2007). Public trans-
port availability, reliability, frequency, affordability and
safety are key factors that can inhibit women’s mobility
and constrain their employment and other opportu-
nities (Grant-Smith, Osborne, and Marinelli 2016;
Whitzman 2013). Despite long-standing engagement
with these issues by feminist scholars, difficulties acces-
sing public transport continue to be challenging for
many women, particularly for those combining com-
muting with broader caring responsibilities (Grant-
Smith, Osborne, and Johnson 2016; Sánchez de Madar-
iaga 2013). Research in communities at the edge of
metropolitan Brisbane confirms that transport avail-
ability and the additional time (and sometimes finan-
cial) costs of travelling off-peak – particularly for
part-time, casual and/or shift workers (who are more
likely to be women, children and young people, and/
or people of colour) – adds additional and intersec-
tional challenges to mobility (Burton and Johnson
2010). These matters can also impact the very safety
of women as they move around the city.
The paper contributed to this special issue by Gard-
ner, Cui and Coiacetto (2017) considers women’s
experiences of harassment on public transport and
the impacts of harassment on women’s travel behav-
iour. Echoing Peake and Rieker’s (2013, 4) reminder
that ‘women have just as much right to go out and to
use public spaces as men, and that their lives should
not be restricted by fear or actual violence’, this paper
discusses harassment and transit behaviour, focusing
on prevalence of harassment and on the resultant
transport-behavioural impacts within a fear of crime
framework. This analysis is used to identify potential
planning solutions for the Australian context.
Building on the theme of women in cities, Reid,
Lloyd and O’Brien’s (2017) contribution considers
women’s perspectives on liveability in vertical commu-
nities through a feminist materialist lens. They argue
that the male dominated neoliberal urban development
approach adopted in today’s cities reflects male values
and interests which impact women in unexpected
ways. Focussing on the under researched but increasing
rate of female residential investment in and occupation
of high density developments, they explore women’s
perceptions of liveability and consumption of space
within vertical communities. They describe experiences
of liveability that are influenced by the materiality of
apartments and buildings that create unsafe and inap-
propriate spaces for children, as well as affective
relations of distance rather than sociality. They suggest
that a greater focus needs to be placed on women’s
needs and participation in urban research and
planning.
Politics, presence and intersectionality
The Prime Ministership of Julia Gillard was an impor-
tant milestone in gender and politics in Australia.
Although Gillard’s era was not marked by an upswing
in feminist policy, her leadership offered hope that the
voices of women might be better heard in the halls of
government, and that misogyny in all its forms
would no longer be unnamed in public discourse.
Her ‘misogyny’ speech went viral (Wright and Holland
2014); it is not often that a female leader of a govern-
ment stands in Parliament and holds her opponent’s
misogyny to scrutiny and account (Donaghue 2015),
however often it might be warranted. This, for a
time, brought gender to the forefront of Australian pol-
itical discourse, and invited a renewed scrutiny of the
intersections of gender, leadership and mainstream
politics. McLean and Maalsen’s (2017) contribution
to this special issue draws on this period in Australian
politics, and concerns how constructions of gender
affect women’s experiences in leadership positions.
They also explore manifestations of community and
feminism in online spaces through the feminist activist
group Destroy the Joint. Online spaces have emerged as
important sites for feminist theorising, co-learning and
organising, and for opening up new ways for people to
participate in feminist projects and join a feminist
community (Keller 2012). McLean and Maalsen’s
analysis of Destroy the Joint as it intersects with Gil-
lard’s leadership provides a lens through which to con-
sider the state of women and politics in Australia.
Whilst gender as a lens for analysis in planning has
received some attention and is generally understood if
not always embraced, intersectionality as a theory and
practice remains marginal. Intersectionality stems from
the work of womanist and other women of colour
scholars, who argued that mainstream/whitestream
feminism could not and did not adequately address
their lived experiences, and could, indeed, perpetuate
their oppression (Collins 2000; Crenshaw 1991;
hooks 1982). It is only fairly recently that intersection-
ality has entered planning discourse (see Frisch 2015;
Irazábal and Huerta 2016; Osborne 2015; Valentine
2007), and Yon and Nadimpalli’s (2017) work in this
special issue is an important contribution to an emer-
ging field. They use intersectionality and Lefebvre’s

‘right to the city’ as twin lenses through which to
explore the intersections of disability, gender and vio-
lence, and to draw out lessons for planners, policy-
makers and legislators.
Celebrating a legacy of women in planning
It is important that planners recognise and reflect on
the gendered nature of planning, particularly as some
areas of planning appear to remain immune to the
influence of the feminist agenda (Greed 1994). Despite
the substantial advances of feminist movements, plan-
ning education and practice has yet to consistently
understand and address the needs of women and has
struggled to adopt intersectionality as a fundamental
planning concern. This has significant practical and
political implications. As earlier papers in the special
issue illustrate, spatial and kyriarchal power structures
(Osborne 2015) create gendered experiences of the
built environment and the planning and provision of
infrastructure and services can have significant impacts
on women’s safety, quality of life and access to oppor-
tunities. One way of improving these outcomes is to
increase the number of women involved in planning,
both as planners and as participants in planning. How-
ever, this is easier said than done and attempts at main-
streaming and increasing women’s representation do
not always achieve the desired outcomes and may
even encourage perverse ones (Alston 2014; Bock
2015; Ferguson and Morena Alarcón 2015). Indeed,
such efforts may serve to increase the representation
of certain kinds of women, with ‘more radical types
of women … seen as too threatening and unsettling’
(Greed 1994, 6). The final two papers in this special
issue celebrate the contributions and legacy of two
such women planners from spatially marginal Austra-
lian states: Margaret Feilman (Order of British Empire)
and Mercia Ferrier.
Margaret Feilman was one of Western Australia’s
most notable and influential planners who pioneered
an approach to town design that integrated the built
form with the natural environment. Amanda Davies
and Julie Brunner reflect on Margaret Feilman’s contri-
butions to planning practice, in particular the establish-
ment of innovative residential neighbourhoods across
Western Australia. Davies and Brunner (2017) reveal
that as an advocate of individualised and situational
planning and of incorporating community values and
concerns she subscribed to many of the philosophies
of the New Town Movement, but also that she recog-
nised the need to adapt British planning solutions to
the Australian social, economic and environmental
context. They celebrate her fierce advocacy that plan-
ning schemes needed to be realistic in their scope
and take account of the resources and needs of
communities.
AUSTRALIAN PLANNER 3
Moving from impacts on place to impacts on prac-
tice, in A Column of One’s Own, Deanna Grant-Smith
and Natalie Osborne reflect on the place of women in
the pages of the journal of the Royal Australian Plan-
ning Institute Journal (the forebear of Australian Plan-
ner). Focussing their attention on the Marion column
penned by Queensland’s Mercia Ferrier between 1977
and 1982, Grant-Smith and Osborne (2017) highlight
the contribution of the column in drawing attention
to the discriminatory employment and planning prac-
tices experienced by women in the planning profession,
including the absence of women in senior planning
positions. They also highlight the contribution of the
column in bringing to Australian planners’ attention
issues associated with the impact of planning on
women’s lives, particularly from an intersectional and
international perspective. Grounded in the gains
made by the feminist movement the column cham-
pioned the unique needs of women in urban design
and planning but situated these within the broader
social challenges experienced by women around their
lack of access to power, resources, education, and
decision-making. In doing so, they argue the column
created a clear link between the need for women in
planning at all levels to undertake planning for and
with women.
Advancing an agenda for women in
planning
Cities can offer many social, economic and political
opportunities to women and girls that are not available
elsewhere, but as Wekerle (2013, 142) has observed
‘gender remains by and large invisible in the articula-
tion of urban policies’. As a reflection of the degree
of influence afforded to gendered issues, although
there is some consideration of difference and justice
more generally, gender as a specific lens for spatial
analysis is neglected in two of the most recent and
influential texts on planning in Australia (Byrne,
Sipe, and Dodson 2014; Thompson and Maginn
2012). The contributions to this special issue seek to
draw attention to and begin to redress this gap.
One way of facilitating the inclusion of women’s
needs in planning decisions is to include women in
these decisions; this can be either as planners or as par-
ticipants in planning processes. Both would result in a
greater increase in planning by women. Collectively the
papers included in this special issue make important
contributions to the advancement of (feminist) urban
studies and considerations of the contributions of
women to planning as an endeavour. While addressing
very serious concerns the contributors (and special
issue editors) remain optimistic about change and
highlight opportunities for and celebrate successes.
The approach advocated across these works is prac-
ticed as a mix of intervention, reinvention, engagement
4 C. BOSMAN ET AL.
and political action which is centred on gender justice
and the right to the city. Indeed in exploring the mul-
tiple ways that women are the objects and subjects of
planning within structures of power, while we cannot
trust that progress in this regard will be linear and
cumulative, we find cause, through these contributions,
to celebrate both the legacy and the future of women in
planning.
Acknowledgements
The efforts of Kylie Legge (Place Partners) in producing the
cover for this special issue and Kirsty Kelly (past CEO of the
Planning Institute of Australia) for conceiving the special
issue and inviting us to be editors are gratefully acknowl-
edged. Our sincere thanks also go to the peer reviewers of
each article, and everyone who submitted work for this
special issue.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
ORCID
Natalie Osborne http://orcid.org/0000-0002-9430-822X
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