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Women's Visions into Action: Heidelberg, Germany
Minu Hemmati (1) Published in: UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (UN DESA) / Division for Sustainable Development & Women’s Environment and Development Organization (WEDO), 1998. Women transform the mainstream. 18 case studies of women activists challenging industry, demanding clean water and calling for gender equality in sustainable development.
1. The City of Heidelberg Location and history: The city of Heidelberg is located on both sides of the river Neckar in the South of Germany. It covers an area of 108,8 square kilometers of which 27,4 square kilometers are developed areas. Heidelberg's first mentioning dates back to the year 1196 and it is home to one of the first European universities, founded in 1386. Having purposely been spared the allied air bombings during World War II Heidelberg has maintained its traditional, romantic character until today. It is known for its beautiful location and surrounding landscape, for its castle, its bridges and picturesque old town center, its universities - and the 3,3 million tourist visitors each year. Citizens, Economy and Housing: Heidelberg is the home of 131,837 citizens, 70,118 (53,2 %) women and 61,719 (46,8 %) men. 112,366 (85,2) are German, 19,471 (14,8 %) are non-German citizens. The percentage of non-German citizens is higher than on the average in Germany (ca. 8 %) due to the large number of foreign university lecturers and students who come from all over the world to work and study at the Heidelberg university as well as the US Army European Headquarter and the NATO Headquarter. About one fifth of the population are students enrolled at the University Heidelberg which covers all faculties, the University of Pedagogical Sciences, the Jewish University and the University of Music. The central role of the university also accounts for the unusually high percentage of young people and single households, an unusually high average level of education and highly qualified workforce. Heidelberg also is home of numerous research institutes and 13 Nobel Prize winners have been Heidelberg citizens. There is only little industrial activity in Heidelberg (printing machines, specialized car suppliers, small chemical industry, sanitary ceramics, biotechnology and surgery instruments) plus several publishing trusts, esp. scientific publishing. As in every German city, most people live in flats, altogether there are 66,135 houses and flats which provide an average of 37,5 square meters of space per person. Public transport systems provide trams and buses covering all boroughs of the city and connecting Heidelberg with other communities in the area. Heidelberg has one main and several peripheral train stations providing services to all major directions as is well connected via autobahn. As traffic is a major area of political debate and has been target of many efforts towards reduction, esp. of CO2 emissions, the public transport systems, esp. the tram system, has been enlarged and improved during the last 15 years. In addition, Heidelberg provides more than 80 kilometers of cycling paths to encourage the use of bicycles, esp. in the city center. Local Authority: The mayors and the city council and its administrative body make up the local authority of the city of Heidelberg. Head of the local authority are the Mayor, since 1990 the Lady Mayor Ms. Beate Weber (Social Democrat), and the four Deputy Mayors for Financial and Legal Affairs, Building and Sports, Social, Cultural and Educational Affairs, and Environment and Energy, respectively. The city council has 40 members, with Christian Democrats, Social Democrats and Green Party Members as major fractions. The percentage of votes for the Green Party in Heidelberg is higher than on the average in Germany (5-10 %); percentages ranging from 10 to over 30 % in the individual boroughs.
Local Agenda 21 Activities in Heidelberg:
Heidelberg has seen a relatively long history of green
politics which accounts for its outstanding efforts and numerous success stories
with regard to environmentally sound energy policies, traffic and transport
policies, waste management and educational efforts and information schemes for
citizens and consumers. To mention the most prominent examples, Heidelberg has
been engaged in energy policies towards CO2 emission reduction since before
1990; published its guidelines for sustainable tourism in 1993; signed the
Charta of Aalborg in May 1994; published its traffic development plan in 1994;
developed guidelines for sustainable restaurant and sustainable hairdresser's
management; and has been involved in the WHO Healthy Cities Project.
Furthermore, environmental policies have increasingly be intertwined with
participatory approaches regarding identifying problem areas and developing
solutions. The city of Heidelberg has received several awards recognizing its efforts, e.g. Heidelberg has been appointed "Federal Capital of Nature Preservation and Environmental Protection 1996/97" and has been one of the four "Cities of the Future - Models for Sustainable Urban Planning" being presented at the World Habitat Day on Oct. 6th, 1997, in Bonn, Germany. The main effort during the last years has been the preparation of the "City Development Plan 2010 - Goals and principles" which has been published in February 1997. The plan acknowledges sustainability as a central goal of urban development and defines four core aspects of sustainability as particularly relevant to the city politics: preservation of resources (i.e. intergenerational justice); social justice (i.e. intragenerational justice); environmental protection; and public participation. Preparing the City Development Plan 2010 involved setting up a special committee which, inter alia, managed public discussion and public participation, e.g. gathering 360 proposals and amendments stemming from participatory processes and incorporating them into the plan. The process has not come to an end with publishing the Plan but is continued on a borough level to develop plans for each of the boroughs. The activities of women and women's groups to be presented here have been an integrated part of these participatory processes. They have been designed and implemented shortly after the City Development Plan process had started. It then became clear that the participatory approaches provided so far did not sufficiently encourage women to participate. Consequently, the gender department of the city's administration suggested to implement a specific methodology to enhance women's participation. This has been carried out successfully and will be described below.
2. Women's NGOs in Heidelberg There are numerous women's organizations in the city of Heidelberg. These and/or their respective members have been involved in the future workshops and the efforts to implement agreed measures. Among them are the Women's Emergency Hotline, the Women's Café, the Women's Bookshop, the Women's Studies Working Group at the Heidelberg university faculty of social sciences, the International Women's Center for Cultural Exchange and Migrant Consultancy, etc. The gender department and women's groups are active members of the Local Agenda 21 Initiative, a NGO multi-stakeholder group promoting LA 21 in Heidelberg, and many women are active members of other relevant NGOs, such as the Heidelberg One World Center, the Rwanda Initiative, the local Terre des Hommes group, the local Amnesty International group, the Green Party, Friends of the Earth etc.
3.a Involvement of Women's Groups The Future Workshop methodology has been used to get women in each borough involved in developing the city development plan. The workshops were initiated by the gender department of the city council and in many cases women's groups and organizations were involved in preparing and organizing women in the borough. The workshops themselves led to the founding of women's groups in 11 of 14 boroughs which are still working today. Parallel to and supporting this process, several gender research studies have been carried out at the university's faculty for social sciences, such as studies on safety and security within the city (streets, places, buildings, parking lots, parks etc.), needs and interests of young mothers in the city, and the future workshop methodology itself. In some cases, gathering the data for these studies has involved women who were active members of the future workshops. Also, the results have been made available for the gender department and the city council. In both cases, the data collected about women's perspectives and visions served as useful resources in the planning process.
3.b Strategies to mobilize women in the boroughs The Future Workshops Methodology has been developed to improve public participation to no longer let experts, politicians and business alone decide about how we live and work. A future workshop is a (at least) one-day seminar made up of three major phases: 1. Critique, 2. Utopia, 3. Realization. A trained moderator and different group work techniques and equipment (brain storming, creativity and visualizing techniques, decision-making techniques etc. ) are used to facilitate the process. The phase of critique provides a space to talk about problems, identifying critical issues and expressing feelings and reflections about what has to be changed and why. This might include expressing anger, angst and frustration about features of the city and everyday problems created by them. In this phase, the work is organized in small groups and the issues collected are gathered to identify focuses of concern. During the second phase of utopia the participants are encouraged to develop a new vision of an ideal city and borough which clearly defines what they feel is needed to feel at home, safe, healthy and happy as a citizen. Several techniques are used to support the visionary thinking and creativity of participants. The moderator will encourage participants not to discuss but to purely gather ideas before considering their advantages and disadvantages. She will gather the ideas and visions visibly on a big board and enhance the visualization with drawings, symbols and pictures as much as possible. In phase three, realization, the ideas are discussed with regard to how they could be put into practice. To structure the discussion the different ideas are roughly rated and the most promising are discussed first. Participants are asked to gather examples of where the ideas have been implemented and consider the results and experiences to discuss possibilities of transferring specific measures to their own boroughs. If there are no examples at hand, participants are encouraged to discuss advantages and disadvantages on the basis of their knowledge and experience. The core aspect of this phase is to plan the implementation of the idea to the utmost possible detail to ensure realization. Finally, specific projects and measures are selected to be implemented first. A successful future workshop ends with putting together a detailed plan of action including assigning tasks and roles to participants. The dates for the future workshops were chosen in accordance with women's needs and professional child care was provided throughout the workshops. The meetings were held in the boroughs to provide short distances.
4. Description of Case from a Gender Perspective The case presented is women's contributions to preparing the "City Development Plan 2010 - Guidelines and Goals". The preparatory process was designed to be participatory from the beginning but was nevertheless lacking sufficient involvement of women. The future workshop methodology was introduced to ensure that during the planning process, women articulated their problems and needs and developed their visions for the future. They identified the most urgent issues and thus set the agenda for planning and action. 177 women participated in the 14 workshops in Heidelberg's 14 boroughs. There were women of all ages, predominantly aged between 25 and 50 and predominantly women with children. A large proportion of participants were mothers who presently work as housewives but want to go back to work outside the home and mothers already integrating family and work responsibilities (3). This sheds some light on where most problem areas in urban life can be found. In eleven boroughs, participants founded groups to continue the work after the workshop. Today, 180 women are actively involved in these groups contributing to the development of their boroughs.
5. Results of the Future Workshops The results of the future workshops were reported back to the gender department and analyzed to identify suggestions which could be carried out short term. The gender department also kept in touch with the groups in the boroughs and individual women on a regular basis to provide support and consultation where necessary. The gender department provided a comprehensive report "Women's Perspectives on Urban Development in Heidelberg" which was incorporated into the amendments for the city development plan and used as a basic resource. As a result, the "City Development Plan 2010 - Guidelines and Goals" is recognizing women's needs and visions extensively. Furthermore, developing specific Planning Guidelines for the individual boroughs - which is currently taking place - will result in even more detailed and concrete plans and action.
Women's Perspectives and Contributions: In general, we can conclude from the experiences with and the outcomes of the future workshop methodology as well as the process initiated by it that the active participation of women provides numerous constructive and indispensable contributions to sustainable urban planning. Women's perspectives, their problems, needs and visions are specific. Women evaluate cities with regard to how many different roles and lifestyles they allow and support. Their needs and suggestions are based on considering their everyday lives and especially include those areas which are not directly related to work outside the home, e.g. family and household work, community issues etc. In particular, women demand urban features and facilities supporting the integration of different areas of life, such as work, family, social, and community roles and responsibilities. Women demand democratic structures and procedures, particularly to overcome the status differences between the sexes and to develop direct mechanisms of participation and involvement in decision-making. They point out deficits in political culture which may prevent effective participation because procedures tend to be less accessible to people with social and family responsibilities. Women demand that local authorities take over responsibilities to actively care for vulnerable groups such as the elderly. Women want to share their traditional responsibilities with other community members for the benefit of the community as a whole. Women want urban environments to be designed in a way that they support the development and maintenance of social relations and networks. They demand spaces and places for community members to meet and communicate easily. This is particularly necessary as the importance of traditional family systems is decreasing and other diverse kinds of social networks become more important. Women demand safety and security in their urban environment. They demand measures against the development of aggression and violence in the minds and behavior of citizens. This can be achieved by social, political, educational, technical and design measures which integral parts of an general approach towards more urban security and safety. Women demand living space at reasonable prices and they demand designing houses and flats in ways supporting the sharing of household responsibilities with their partners and integrating different realms of work, family and community life. Women's needs and demands regarding traffic and public and private transport are specific. Traffic and transport design and facilities have to meet the needs of families and mothers in particular. Much too often traffic and transport are still planned around the needs of people (i.e. men) mostly using cars to travel from home to work and back, not around the needs of people (i.e. mothers and children) using cars, bicycles, walking and public transport to travel individually and in groups to school, shopping facilities, playgrounds, work etc. Examples of Action Taken in Heidelberg: Specific actions and ongoing projects stemming from the initiated future workshops and the women's groups in the boroughs are numerous and very different in target and scale. Some examples include:
To put all these and more ideas and measures into practice women had to overcome numerous obstacles - ranging from inexperience to speak up publicly and address officials to following through their lobbying efforts, getting to know the local authority system, and acquiring skills to operate as editors, planners and successful networkers. The future workshops and the ongoing women's groups resulted in several effects stated by the participants themselves. These include: Above all, participants mention that communication in their neighbourhoods and communities has improved significantly. They enjoy the larger and closer networks of cooperation and exchange among community members which have been initiated by the workshops and further facilitated by participants' activities. These experiences are closely related with intensified identification with their local environment, i.e. a stronger urban identity. This, as demonstrated by psychological research, is related to increased motivation to contribute and participate - so that the processes of participation and identification are mutually supportive. This is beneficial for individuals as well as the community as a whole. Participants feel encouraged and empowered to contribute more to community life and politics. Having gained considerable knowledge and experience on how local authorities operate and how one can contribute to and influence their work, women are significantly more aware of their opportunities and responsibilities regarding their communities. Experiencing effective group work and learning about methods to improve creative thinking and group decision-making, participants feel that they can transfer their new skills to other areas of their lives, e.g. their families and work environments.
6. Conclusions and Next Steps Introducing the future workshop methodology has had several positive effects even before all the measures planned have been carried out successfully. Defining the problems and discussing appropriate measures has had considerable effects on the social structure and dynamics in the individual boroughs as well as the city as a whole. Participatory processes are now better known and appreciated by the local authority and the public. Individuals have developed numerous and detailed visions of the future of their city. A multitude of concrete problems have been addressed effectively. In 11 of the 14 boroughs the women's groups which have been founded after the first future workshop are still alive and working. A common focus of their work is community life - communication and networking in the borough towards cultural change and increased "community spirit" encouraging people to identify, share and help each other. Furthermore, these groups are relatively well known to the public and the local authorities. The future workshop methodology can be recommended as a measure to enhance women's participation. The benefits for women and the city are obvious - women's daily lives and the community culture are improved, the city planning is more inclusive and of higher quality. Furthermore, one can expect a considerable and long-lasting capacity building effect: women who have participated in the future workshop process have to a large percentage continued to be involved in the borough's and city's politics. From the experience in Heidelberg we can conclude that several measures need to be taken to increase and sustain women's participation in decision making: 1. Capacity Building, e.g. through a methodology like the future workshops. 2. Ensuring the effectiveness of women's participation: If women see that governments and local authorities do actually use their contributions and put them into practice, they will be willing to invest their time and energy in participatory planning processes. 3. Providing resources to cover participatory processes, e.g. funding for expenses and child care, office and meeting rooms etc. 4. Spreading the word: Media coverage of ongoing participatory processes should be improved, esp. regarding the work of smaller groups in boroughs; contributions to the plans and measures published and undertaken have to be clearly identified to encourage others to participate.
Footnotes (1) I wish to thank the following friends and colleagues for providing material and helpful comments on earlier drafts of this article: Doerthe Domzig (Head of the Gender Department of the City of Heidelberg), Beate Weber (Lady Mayor of the City of Heidelberg), Dr. Harald Schaeffler (Local Agenda 21 Initiative of Heidelberg), and Angelika Scholbeck (Green Party Member of the City Council of Heidelberg). (2) More information about the city of Heidelberg can be obtained from its web-site at http://www.heidelberg.de (3) Mothers following a full-time career commitment are still not the accepted majority of mothers in Germany. A traditional "mother-child-ideology" assuming that children need to be with their mothers full time is still prevalent. Furthermore, and reflecting this ideology, there are still not enough child care facilities although the Federal Government in 1996 passed a law stating the right for each child to demand appropriate child care facilities from the age of 2 onwards.
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Copyright © Minu Hemmati, 2006 |
