Moving safely at night? Women’s nocturnal mobilities in Recife, Brazil and Brussels, Belgium

Abstract

This paper examines the links between women’s un/safety and their night-time mobilities in Brussels, Belgium and Recife, Brazil. While the significance of women’s intersectional identities to the construction of fear and safety in urban space has been well documented in feminist urban geography, we argue that the lens of South-North comparison highlights specific ways in which local urban spaces are implicated in women’s experiences of un/safety. A comparative perspective draws out the spatial and temporal embeddedness of un/safety, while at the same time challenges the framing of particular cities and areas as either safe or unsafe (which is particularly damaging when it reproduces simple global North – global South binaries). The paper draws on mixed-method research combining a questionnaire-based survey and a series of interviews with women in Recife and Brussels. The four dimensions examined include transport modes; situated experiences of un/safety; the accumulation of unsafety feelings over the long term; and the work women perform in maintaining mobility. We find that while unsafety broadly limits women’s access to cities at night, feeling unsafe plays out differently in specific and situated interactions, many of which are recognisable from both Brussels and Recife. Across the two research locations, women’s mobility strategies at night are similar, in that they involve extensive planning, preparation, and drawing on financial and non-financial resources. We conclude with some reflections on the role of comparative research in the feminist geographies of gendered urban mobilities, particularly in relation to previously little-studied cities.

Keywords:

• Gendered mobilities
• women
• night-time mobility
• feelings of unsafety
• comparative research

Acknowledgements

We would like to thank all the women who participated in this research and shared their experiences with us. Many thanks also to the editor and three anonymous reviewers for their feedback, input and guidance.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Leila Farina

Leila Farina is an architect and urban planner graduated from the Federal University of Pernambuco (2013), Brazil. She holds an MSc in Urban studies from the Vrije Universiteit Brussel (distinction; 2019). Her Master’s thesis, which this paper draws on, explored women’s perception and experiences of safety affecting mobility habits at night in Brussels, Belgium and Recife, Brazil. Leila’s research interests are concerned with gender studies, urban built environment and safety in public spaces.

Kobe Boussauw

Kobe Boussauw teaches in the MSc in Urban Design and Spatial Planning (STeR*) at the Vrije Universiteit Brussel. His research deals with the reciprocal relationships between mobility, planning, and the built environment, both in an analytical and in a policy oriented sense. Within the first track, the way in which various aspects of spatial structure interact with each other is assessed, whereas in the second track the focus is on decision-making processes that impact on such spatial functioning. Kobe’s concern is mainly with the relationship between proximity as a spatial quality, urban livability, and sustainability.

Anna Plyushteva

Anna Plyushteva is an urban and transport geographer and is a Departmental Research Lecturer in Transport Studies at the School of Geography and the Environment and the Transport Studies Unit, University of Oxford. Her research focuses on urban mobility in terms of daily practices, socio-technical infrastructures, and gendered relations. In her role as Marie Sklodowska-Curie Research Fellow at Cosmopolis (2017-2019), Anna researched commuting in urban shift work in Brussels and Sofia, and night-time mobility in particular. She completed her PhD in Human Geography at University College London (2016), and holds an MSc in International Development Studies (distinction; 2009) from the University of Amsterdam.