Politizing futures of territories: municipal climate change adaptation plans and the issues of gender equality and mobility

Abstract

Mobility and transport are central themes for understanding the future of territories. Mobility practices and styles are strongly associated with complex realities, such as those related to climate change. Despite the centrality of the concepts, both mobility and climate change have taken a long time to be problematized, under the prism of gender equality. However, the existing literature allows us to establish that, given the complexity of the societal challenges that lie ahead, gender is increasingly a determining variable, to be considered, from a double perspective, both by policymakers at the local level and by decision-makers. In this sense, our argument focuses on the political and sociological relevance of gender in the climate debate and urban mobility. More specifically, this article seeks to understand how gender and urban mobility issues were integrated into Municipal Plans for Adaptation to Climate Change, in 17 municipalities in Portugal. To this end, a thematic content analysis of the Municipal Plans was carried out, aiming to (i) map the priority measures of the municipalities, in relation to mobility; ( ii ) and understand how gender is considered in adaptation measures to climate change. This text summarizes the results achieved, starting with a brief theoretical framework on the various proposed concepts.