Women in US cities: urban captives
Abstract This article examines the contemporary position of women in US urban areas. It seeks to explain the increasing numbers of service-dependent women residing in urban locations through reference to the historical evolution of the urban political economy as it reflects the national and global political economy. More specifically, it recognizes that policies at the national level influence and change urban form and function, a process which has definite and identifiable consequences for society.
Older Women in the City
The particular vulnerabilities of women and the vicissitudes of aging1 combine to isolate the older woman. This situation, which urban settings often exacerbate, is our concern now. Because so many older women live in cities, often in great difficulty, our subject is hardly a trivial one. Despite this, and despite ruminations about the "graying of America," old women have received surprisingly little scholarly attention. Until relatively recently, large numbers of old women in the city or elsewhere were scarce. In 1900 the average life expectancy at birth for white women was 48.7, for nonwhite women 33.5. However, in 1976, the average life expectancy at birth was 77.3 for white, 72.6 for nonwhite females. The proportion of women reaching age 65 has also changed dramatically. By 1973, 82.2 percent of all white and 68.1 percent of all nonwhite women could expect to reach age 65. Obviously changes in these mortality patterns have had marked effects on the demographic
Letting Women in? Gender Mainstreaming in Regional Policies
Gender mainstreaming has over the last ten years become the dominant strategy of integrating gender issues in public policy. This article presents regional policy as a broad and increasingly important policy field to study, and analyses gender mainstreaming in this policy field in the Norwegian and the Swedish contexts. How do problem representations surrounding “gender equality” and “gender mainstreaming” produce meanings of gender as well as construct possibilities for change? The article shows that, despite some differences between the two countries, gender mainstreaming in regional policy can to a large extent be read as meaning “women”. Women are in this context given a narrow subject position and are constructed as lacking what it takes to produce sustainable regional growth. The concluding discussion highlights the relations between the implementation of gender mainstreaming and neo‐liberal political trends.