1 minute read
2. Include an intersectional feminist perspective in urban planning
Ever since the huge grass-root wave of 1975 in Iceland, where women went out to the streets to object to the prevalent gender pay gap, the representation of women in politics skyrocketed, and in merely 5 years, in 1980, Iceland voted in the first democratically-elected female president in the world. With higher representation in the houses, policy changes followed, and in 1986, when guaranteed maternity leave was a novel idea, Iceland passed a resolution ensuring 6 months of paid maternity leave.
But as progressive as this law was, it defeated the very purpose for which it was introduced. It encouraged new mothers to stay at home, while the new fathers kept working, thus reinforcing the cultural norms and stereotypes at the heart of the pay gap. To overcome this shortcoming, the lawmakers formulated a radical legislation — paternal leave to new fathers on a use it or lose it basis, which pressurized them to take it. The Prime Minister of Iceland, Katrín Jakobsdóttir, asserts that obligational paternity leave has made a positive impact on the culture of men in Iceland. It really makes all the difference, not just at home, but also in the job market, because now while hiring either a man or a woman, the recruiter is aware that both will take a maternity/paternity leave.
Advertisement
Currently, Iceland has been on the top of Gender Pay Gap Index by the World Economic Forum’s Gender Pay Gap Report for 11 years in a row.
2. Include an intersectional feminist perspective in urban planning.
Location: Barcelona, Spain
Organization: Col·lectiu Punt 6
Women have always been marginalised in urban planning. Collectiu Punt 6, a feminist collective of female architects and urban planners located in
Barcelona, Spain, has created planning approaches and tools that incorporate women as both objects and subjects of urban planning, as well as experts in everyday life.
The article focuses on Collectiu Punt 6's participatory tools, which can be utilised at many phases of planning, from assessing to evaluating policies and interventions, as well as tools for women's empowerment with the objective of encouraging bottom-up planning models.
