Women and Planning : Creating Gendered Realities

The first comprehensive history and analysis of women and the planning movement, covering the philosophical, practical and policy dimensions. A central theme is how men have rewritten planning in their own image in creating modern urban space.

Planning is currently a male profession, but an analysis of a century of town planning reveals this to be a new development; women have been central to the planning movement since it began. Women and Planning is the first comprehensive history and analysis of women and the planning movement, covering the philosophical, practical and policy dimensions of `planning for women''. Beyond the marginalization of women, modern, scientific planning hides a story of past links with eugenics, colonialism, artistic, utopian and religious movements and the occult. Central to the discussion is the questioning of how male planners have rewritten planning in their own image, projecting patriarchal assumptions in their creation of `urban realities''. Issues of class, sexuality, ethnicity and disability are raised by the fundamental question of `Who is being planned for?''