A data feminist approach to urban data practice: Tenant power through eviction data

ABSTRACT

Acknowledging the role of data in reproducing (and disrupting) existing power relationships, this article argues data feminism is a useful intervention in data practice for planners and others interested in engaging in data ethics evaluation of complex urban problems. Through critical organizational analyses of eviction-related projects in Atlanta, Georgia, and Richmond, Virginia, we illustrate the data feminism approach to reimagining eviction data as a tool for tenant empowerment. We find that why, how, for whom, and with whom we collect, present, and organize eviction data is both driven by and drives the narratives, policy, and practice around eviction. Shifting the power, process, and participants of eviction data creation can facilitate tenant organizing and a rebalancing of the landlord-tenant power and information dynamic. Such a reorientation of the purpose, creation, and usage of data could promote data justice across a variety of urban policy areas.

KEYWORDS:

• Eviction
• data
• case study

Acknowledgments

Thank you to the reviewers, the editor Bernadette Hanlon, and participants at the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning conference for their helpful comments. We would also like to acknowledge Pearse Victor Haley, Colin Delargy, Noldy Belizaire, Phillip Carnell, Megan Conville, Michelle Sanders, Cameron Jones, Sarah Stein, Erik Woodworth, Natalie McLaughlin, and the members of the GA Eviction Moratorium Working Group. Thanks to Catherine D’Ignazio, Wonyoung So, and other attendees of the Beyond Fairness: Big Data, Racial Justice & Housing conference at MIT for their insight and feedback.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. As this is an organizational analysis, no human subjects were involved. However, the authors received IRB approval for related eviction research where individuals were the subject.

Additional information

Funding

Work mentioned in the Richmond case was partially funded by Richmond Memorial Health Foundation and work mentioned in the Atlanta case was funded in part by a grant from the Russell Sage Foundation [G-2010-28252].

Notes on contributors

Megan E. Hatch

Megan E. Hatch is an associate professor of urban policy and city management in the Maxine Goodman Levin School of Urban Affairs at Cleveland State University. She studies the variation in policies within the U.S. federalist system and the effects those disparities have on social equity, individuals, and institutions. Within this theme, she examines three policy areas: rental housing, state preemption of local laws, and the CDBG program.

Elora Lee Raymond

Elora Lee Raymond is an urban planner and assistant professor in the School of City and Regional Planning in the College of Design at Georgia Tech. She is interested in the financialization of housing and property in land, displacement and dispossession through housing systems, post-disaster housing studies, housing justice, and decolonial pacific studies.

Benjamin F. Teresa

Benjamin F. Teresa is an associate professor of urban and regional studies and planning at Virginia Commonwealth University. His research focuses on understanding urban housing, education, arts, and community organizing and development. He is also the director of the RVA Eviction Lab, a community-responsive research center for addressing housing instability.

Kathryn Howell

Kathryn Howell is the director of the National Center for Smart Growth and an associate professor of urban studies and planning at the University of Maryland. Prior to coming to NCSG, she was the co-founder and co-director of the RVA Eviction Lab and an associate professor of urban and regional planning at Virginia Commonwealth University. Dr. Howell’s research unpacks concepts of physical and cultural displacement and power in changing communities and investigates ways that policy and planning can be used to address these issues.