#acityforall

Catatan Kota Kita untuk Hari Perempuan Sedunia 2019

Di dalam tulisan Dolores Hayden, seorang ahli sejarah, urbanis, dan profesor emeritus dari Yale University, bertajuk What would a Non-Sexist city be like? Speculations on Housing, Urban Design, and Human Work,  ia mempertanyakan bagaimana (menjadikan) rupa sebuah kota yang tidak seksis dan lebih inklusif gender. Hayden mengatakan aspirasi ini perlu didukung dengan transformasi cara pikir dan nalar dalam melihat berbagai ruang; baik itu ruang domestik, komunitas atau kampung dan tetangga terdekat, dan ruang kota, sebagai bagian intrinsik yang dapat memfasilitasi peningkatan kualitas hidup perempuan. Oleh karena itu, Hayden membahas tentang pentingnya mengalamatkan kebutuhan dan persepsi perempuan yang sama sekali berbeda ketika berinteraksi di ruang-ruang tersebut. Dia mendorong para perencana untuk melihat dengan kacamata keadilan gender, mengikutsertakan pemahaman akan perbedaan ini, dalam proses pembentukan tempat (placemaking) di kota.

Di Kota Kita, kami terus mengusahakan proses perencanaan inklusif yang semakin berbasis data, pengetahuan, dan pengalaman hidup masyarakat, termasuk perempuan. 

Kota dengan keadilan gender membuat kota lebih layak dan lebih baik dalam melayani masyarakatnya, termasuk oleh golongan masyarakat yang kerap kali terlupakan seperti anak-anak, penyandang disabilitas, warga miskin kota, minoritas seksual, dan lain-lain. Saat imajinasi dan keputusan perencana mengikutsertakan perempuan sebagai subjek dengan kebutuhan tertentu, kami yakin kalau kota-kota Indonesia akan lebih baik. Selain itu kami percaya, saat perempuan mampu mengambil posisi strategis sebagai perencana, periset, dan pengambil keputusan misalnya, mereka akan membantu mengadvokasikan untuk kehidupan kota yang lebih nyaman dan adil secara merata.

 Contoh, bagaimana kita mendorong fasilitas dan peraturan penggunaan transportasi publik  dapat ditingkatkan sehingga menjamin keamanan setiap penggunanya, terutama perempuan, atau ketersediaan fasilitas sanitasi publik yang membantu meningkatkan kesehatan publik dan perempuan, kesempatan dan kepemimpinan perempuan di dunia kerja dan politik dapat membantu memperkecil kesenjangan dan mengurangi diskriminasi dan minim representasi perempuan, dan seterusnya.

Secara kelembagaan, Kota Kita sangat mendukung karya dan kepemimpinan perempuan. Dalam menjalankan berbagai inisiatif program di lebih dari 15 kota Indonesia, partisipasi anggota tim perempuan merata. Di Kota Kita perempuan menempati berbagai posisi, sebagai penanggung jawab, pelaksana, maupun pengambil keputusan. Di dalam semangat Hari Perempuan Sedunia 2019, kami menghadirkan pendapat, aspirasi, tantangan, dan pesan para perempuan Kota Kita tentang peran mereka dalam perencanaan dan pembangunan kota, dan bagaimana kita dapat bergerak bersama untuk kota yang semakin inklusif:

Kiri-kanan searah jarum jam: Melinda, Carlotta, Nina, Zahra, Paulista, Icha, Husna, Rizqa (tengah)

Icha Thamrin, Manajer Program

Sebagai seorang perempuan dan ibu, saya melihat perencanaan dan pengelolaan kota-kota Indonesia masih didominasi oleh peran laki-laki. Saya rasa bukan karena perempuan tidak mampu tetapi perlu ada usaha (atau institusionalisasi) yang lebih efektif tentang representasi perempuan di dalam perencanaan dan pengambilan keputusan di kota. Saya bermimpi kota Indonesia semakin inklusif, ramah bagi anak-anak saya nantinya, dan perempuan, serta nyaman bagi seluruh warga.

Melinda Martinus, Manajer Program dan Riset Sebagai perempuan dan periset, saya percaya kalau perempuan memiliki cara pikir dan persepsi , serta peranan yang cergs, khas, dan berbeda. Apabila pemikiran dan gagasan tersebut dapat menginformasi perencanaan dan pembangunan lebih lanjut, saya yakin semakin banyak gagasan baik yang dapat menuntun arah pembangunan kota-kota Indonesia yang lebih inklusif.

Rizqa Hidayani, Manajer Program

Menurut saya, perencanaan yang adil dan pro-perempuan perlu didukung dengan ketersediaan pengetahuan, dari data dan pengalaman hidup, sehingga dapat bermunculan intervensi dan kolaborasi yang tepat sasaran dan tepat guna.

Paulista Surjadi, Direktur Komunikasi dan Advokasi Partisipasi perempuan di dalam perencanaan dan pembangunan kota tidak one-size-fits-all dan representasi perlu dilakukan secara adil. Ada berbagai identitas, kebutuhan, aspirasi, dan tantangan perempuan yang spesifik sehingga tidak perlu diseragamkan. Namun satu hal yang saya yakini adalah kita harus memulai (sehingga memantik partisipasi lebih banyak dan matang) dari keberpihakan yang dimanifestasi lewat wacana, tulisan,  kampanye sosial, dan ulasan tentang peran perempuan di perkotaan. Semakin sering kita menggulirkan diskusi ini ke publik, saya berharap kompleksitas isu perempuan dapat terus menjadi perhatian bersama.

Carlotta Fontana Valenti, Staf Magang, Desainer Urban Sebagai perempuan dan desainer urban, saya merasa memiliki tanggung jawab untuk mencipta ruang-ruang kota yang memberi kesempatan kepada perempuan. Perencanaan dan pembangunan di arus utama memiliki banyak relasi kuasa yang tidak imbang sehingga suara dan aspirasi perempuan kerap kali tidak diikutsertakan. Lewat metode desain partisipatoris, saya ingin terus mendengar dan melakukan pekerjaan dengan lebih sensitif terhadap berbagai kebutuhan.  Saya tahu dengan inklusivitas hadir pekerjaan tambahan untuk mengolah hal-hal yang tadinya asing atau bahkan tidak terlihat, tetapi saya rasa ini adalah perjalanan panjang yang harus dimulai sekarang.

Nina Asterina, Manajer Program Kita butuh peran aktif perempuan dari berbagai latar belakang, gagasan, dan keterampilan terwadahi dan direfleksikan menjadi agenda perencanaan dan pembangunan yang adil dan inklusif. Saya rasa proses tersebut harus dimulai dari budaya saling mendengar, menghargai pendapat, dan kebebasan berpendapat.

Fildza Husna, Staf Komunikasi Sebagai perencana dan anggota organisasi masyarakat sipil, saya merasa salah satu tugas terbesar kita adalah mendengar berbagai suara perempuan dari berbagai latar belakang dan konteks. Kebutuhan setiap warga dan perempuan pun berbeda, tetapi bagaimana kekuatan dan semangat partisipasi ini bisa dirasakan dengan lebih merata dan menyeluruh. Perjalanan masih panjang dan mari terus bersemangat menggelorakan semangat baik untuk keadilan.

Zahra, Staf Magang, Lulusan Sosiologi Lewat kerja-kerja saya, saya ingin membantu mewujudkan kota yang ramah perempuan. Kota ramah perempuan itu mungkin, menurut saya bentuknya adalah kota yang adil dan dapat dimulai dengan memperkecil kesenjangan kesempatan perempuan dan laki-laki di dalam kehidupan perkotaan.

How can we make sure women and girls’ voices are included in the planning and development of Indonesian cities?

Cities are not lived in and perceived in the same way by women, as men. Women have different perspectives and different needs in navigating urban life, including their mobility options, access to basic services, to vulnerabilities from climate change and proneness to gender-based violence. The first step to a more inclusive cities is to understand what women need and and how they are different, also what infrastructure and systemic improvements should be made to serve women more equitably.

In Kota Kita, we believe in a city that is built by active citizen participation and collective action. A city for all that is inclusive of women, girls, youth, and the often marginalised groups like the urban poor, persons with disabilities, and the sexual minorities. We believe that women’s voices and participation in the development of our cities will lay the foundation for how we can overcome inequality, promote sustainability, and ultimately improve our cities.

Taking into account the complexity and richness of women’s roles and participation in the cities, on this International Women’s Day, we invite you to think of the ways we can include women and girls’ voices in urban planning and governance of our cities. Here are some target areas in planning that will make a big difference in women’s lives and livelihoods:

Political Representation 

Decentralisation in Indonesia has provided the transfer of decision-making authority, budgeting and governance to city-level and district governments. It opened up opportunities for women to participate in influencing budget and policy that have the most impact to their life. Based on Kota Kita’s research in 2016 with the Making All Voices Count program, women’s active participation in Musyawarah Perencanaan Pembangunan or musrenbang (participatory planning and development forum) in Indonesia can support the formation of gender-sensitive and more pro-poor policies, usually covering public health and education budget allocation. On another level, despite the mandate that was launched in Indonesia in 2002 for political parties to field at least 30 % women in its list of parliamentary candidates, women are still underrepresented in Indonesia’s parliament, at the national, regional, provincial and district levels. These two conditions show a pressing need to advocate and push for women’s participation and influence in civic participation and politics.

Accessible and Safe Mobility Options

In many households in Indonesia, women are least privileged to use the motorized transportation for mobility, turning to alternative options such as walking or cycling. However, increasing motorization, the lack of adequate infrastructure, economic boundaries and other social and cultural constraints makes cycling unpopular in many cities. Women are particularly more vulnerable to the effects of these limitations. Since 2015, Our Women on Wheels (WoW) in Solo promotes bicycle for women and girls to increase their mobility and multiply the way they can participate in urban life, leading women to better lives and incomes. Here, the bicycle is not only a mode for sustainable mobilization, but also a tool for gender equality and independence.

From the process, we noted infrastructure and safety  as the main concerns for women cyclists and for women mobility in general. It is followed by norms and attitudes towards women on the street and bicycle design. Our collective work and advocacy for infrastructure improvement resulted in the recuperation and extension of slow lanes and bicycle lanes in Solo. It remains an ongoing process to improve the uses of non-motorized transportation in the city, but a push in infrastructure improvement, can contribute to a more widespread promotion of bicycle in the city, while alleviating the barriers and challenges of women on being mobile.

Improving gender-based planning starts with data

There have been progress made to include women’s perspectives in planning and development of Indonesian cities. In different scales, women’s participation in planning have been institutionalized, for example through women-led musrenbang and empowerment of neighborhood level women’s groups (PKK). However, there remains a big homework to improve gender-sensitivity and inclusivity in planning and development agenda and policies. 

The 2017 Annual Report is now available 

In 2017, Kota Kita grouped its activities in sectors in order to strengthen our organizational capacity and expertise in specific focus areas. 

Governance, Inclusivity and Resilience serve as frameworks to manage our different initiatives and achieve the organization’s ultimate vision and mission. In this way, we can integrate our work across all sectors and the sustainable urban development agenda, and include the different actors to reach our common goals.

Our highlights of the year were the growing support by local government and other stakeholders, that have expanded beyond Solo, Central Java, to Banjarmasin, South Kalimantan, to develop and launch an urban diagnostic platform (datakota.id) to help improve the practices of evidence-based planning. 

Moreover, Kota Kita’s participatory methodology was successfully implemented to map and identify constraints and opportunities for disability inclusion in city planning and policy, and resulted in the development of a disability- inclusive city profile.

 Our action research initiative on the creative industry that was started in the beginning of year 2017 are evolving and we aim to bring back the knowledge to the kampong sites for collaborative work to support for economic resilience.

We were consistent with our efforts to provide capacity building to young activists to encourage for more vibrant social movement in Indonesia through our Urban Citizenship Academy (now with more than 100 alumni participants in 4 cities in Indonesia). The Urban Social Forum, the fifth one last year brought together a thousand of urban activists sharing their experiences and continued to promote healthy civic participation in consolidating supports for changes in our cities.

The results that we achieved in 2017 were built on the creativity, methodology, innovation also good spirits, collaborations, and partnerships that we have learned from during the last year.  

Kota Kita Presented Research Work-in-progress on Creative Kampongs of Solo in International Conference in Bradford, United Kingdom

Earlier this month, Kota Kita was in the United Kingdom to attend the Development Studies Association (DSA) Conference in the University of Bradford. The conference comprised of 59 panels with more than 350 papers presented, exploring on ‘sustainability’ as a concept in development theory and practice and implemented in diverse spatial, ecological, and social economic contexts”- urban and rural areas, stable and conflict-affected countries, and emerging nations and marginal regions. We viewed the conference title ‘Interrogating Sustainability – societies, growth, and social justice’ as an invite to view and analyze ‘sustainability’ from the different lenses and perspectives; an invite to see it from ‘problem solving’ perspective’, also the critical theory perspective examining the power relations within the discourse of sustainability to achieve social justice and equitable societies.

Kota Kita’s delegates, Ahmad Rifai and Nina Asterina presented our current research on dynamic of creative industry, mostly of small-medium scale enterprises, that formed into urban economic assemblages (as a kampong or sentra) and their quest for economic sustainability. The paper is titled ‘The creative Kampongs of Solo, Indonesia: a case study in public policy, informal inventiveness, and sustainability” and examined the condition of creative urban kampong / sentra in Solo, examining the cases of Kampong Apem (traditional dessert) in Sewu, Kampong Lukis (painting) in Sangkrah, and Bird cage sentra in five kampongs in Solo. The research also studied these businesses’ current collaborations with the government and their innovation in different spatial and social-economic context within the Greater Solo (Solo city and 6 municipalities of Sukoharjo, Karanganyar, Klaten, Boyolali, Wonogiri, and Sragen).

Kota Kita is also contributing to a collaborative research with a colleague from University College London (UCL) in critically assessing the roles and opportunities of kampong as urban economic assemblages, either as a self-made entity that formation is inspired by a shared imagination and vision or a branded creative kampong by the city government. The work in progress was presented by Nicholas Phelps of UCL on the same occasion. Attending the conference had been a great experience for the Kota Kita team to be able to share our experiences in Solo and learning from the global perspectives. 

Kota Kita Celebrates the International Women’s Day 2017: Making cities work for women

Cities are not lived in and perceived in the same way by women as men. Women have different perspectives and different needs, often time women have difficulties in mobility options, gender-based violence, access to housing and jobs, and vulnerabilities from climate change. The first step to a more inclusive and safe cities is to understand what women need and what improvements should be made to serve women more equitably. One way that could be realized is to ensure for women’s participation in the decision-making in local government, also incorporating their voice and perspectives in urban planning and management.

In Kota Kita, we believe in a city that is built by citizen participation and collective action. A city for all that is inclusive of  women and other marginalised groups like children, the disabled, and the urban poor. In many of our works in different cities in Indonesia, we have experienced more and more empowered women leaders and planners, as they lead the way to formulate more gender-sensitive solutions for better cities. It is an encouraging start that will ensure a long way towards making cities work for all citizens. We believe that women’s participation and leadership in the development of our cities will lay the foundation for how we can overcome inequality, promote sustainability, and ultimately improve our cities.