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Gender and Agency Across the Borderscape in
Mitrovica, Kosovo
Alex Gibson | 11125179 Universiteit van Amsterdam Master thesis: Conflict Resolution & Governance MSc Word Count: 16,171 Supervised by Polly Pallister-Wilkins Second reader: Darshan Vigneswaran June 2016i Acknowledgements I would like to thank all of my research participants in Mitrovica for being so forthcoming during my stay, and to all of the organisations I worked with for being so welcoming and hospitable. I would also like to thank Polly Pallister-Wilkins, as my supervisor, for providing valuable advice and feedback throughout the research and writing process.
Abstract Research within border studies has been slow to analyse the uneven impacts of divided cities and the borderscape on individuals and groups. This thesis aims to address this oversight by using ethnographic research based in the divided city of Mitrovica, Kosovo to question how the bordered environment may have gendered consequences for its population. As a result of engaging with civil society and other actors during fieldwork, this thesis identifies a number of key gender issues that are subsequently situated within a theoretical framework of fear, agency, and habitus to make sense of the connection been gender and the borderscape. Key words: gender, agency, habitus, fear, borderscape
Notes • The city is known as Mitrovicë in the Albanian language, and Kosovska Mitrovica in Serbian. In English, the city is referred to Mitrovica, which is the spelling I will use for this thesis. • In 2013, the northern part of the city became a separate municipality known as North Mitrovica. At appropriate times, I will use ‘North’ and ‘South’ to differentiate between the predominantly Serb area and the majority Albanian area, but when I refer to Mitrovica, this will include the city in its entirety. • Kosovo’s independence from Serbia is still contested. This thesis will remain neutral and will not make judgements on the matter of independence. • At times, I will refer to Kosovo Albanians as Albanians and Kosovo Serbs as Serbs for brevity. Similarly, I may make reference to ‘Serbian society’ and ‘Albanian society’ to distinguish the two dominant communities in Mitrovica.
Contents 1. Introduction………...1 2. Rationale……….3 3. Literature review………..5 3.1. Divided cities……….5 3.2. Bordering……….7 3.3. Borderscapes……….8 3.4. Public/private divide………9 4. Theoretical framework………11 4.1. Habitus..……….11 4.2. Agency……….12 4.3. Gender & space……….………13 4.4. Geographies of fear………14 4.5. Feminist nationalism……….15 5. Methodology……….16 6. Empirical findings and analysis………..22 6.1. The intersection of geographies of fear and gender issues………….22 6.1.1. Spatial identities………..23 6.1.2. Domestic violence across the borderscape………..24 6.1.3. Summary………27 6.2. Street harassment, agency, and geographical and cultural distinctions……….28 6.2.1. Fear, space and place………28 6.2.2. Street harassment and spatialised agency………29
6.2.3. An ungendered view of fear………32 6.2.4. Cultural distinctions………..33 6.2.5. Summary………..33 6.3. Women, participation, and pluralism in NGOs………....35 6.3.1. The state of the NGO sector………35 6.3.2. The NGO sector’s position in society……….36 6.3.3. NGO projects and gendered differences……….37 6.3.4. Marginalisation and empowerment………37 6.3.5. Pluralism and education………..38 6.3.6. Pluralism, nationalism and gender………..39 6.3.7. Inter-community or intra-community………40 6.3.8. Gender balance and representation………42 6.3.9. Male participation………43 6.3.10. Summary……….44 7. Conclusion………46 8. Bibliography……….49 9. Additional sources………..………54
Introduction The divided city of Mitrovica in Kosovo has been the site of considerable social and ethnic tension since the cessation of the Kosovo conflict in 1999. The river Ibar running through the city serves as the border separating the largely Kosovo Serb community in North Mitrovica from the Kosovo Albanian majority South. Identity-based conflict has persisted between the two communities with sporadic violence and persistent hostilities representing a continuation of wartime tension. The city has served as a microcosm of the Kosovo-Serbia conflict as a result of its sizeable ethnically Serb population, and is at the heart of Serbia’s territorial claim to Kosovo, which is strongly opposed by Kosovo’s Albanian community and international actors. The division has been entrenched through the presence of KFOR and other international peacekeeping forces, as well as the initiation of parallel institutions on the North and South sides of the city (Björkdahl & Gusic, 2013). The Ibar bridge, most frequently the scene of violent flashpoints in the post-war period, continues to be monitored by international forces, which has, to some extent, ‘facilitated the polarisation, normalised the divided, and legitimised those that struggle for partition’ (Björkdahl & Gusic, 2013:7). The division has intensified the distinction between cultures, as societies with different languages, alphabets, currencies and even vehicle registration plates operate in parallel to each other. A set of behaviours can develop as a result of the entrenchment of division that reveal how everyday agency is affected and how structures bind individuals to certain norms. Analysing these behaviours provides an insight into how exposure to certain environments – for example, interacting across the borderscape – can limit and structure individual and collective actions. This notion takes influence from Pierre Bourdieu’s theory of habitus (1990; see also 1977, 1991), which will thus provide the sociological framework for this thesis. This climate of unrest and division brings debates about public space, resistance and agency to the fore as a way of making sense of how individuals and groups mobilise and produce events of everyday life in a city of separation. The structure and dynamics of divided cities impart profoundly uneven effects on their populations, who have to negotiate bordered spaces caught up in states of securitisation and the production of fear.
This thesis will address an absence in existing literature of the gendered connotations of divided cities. The impact of bordered environments, social tensions and segregation are predominantly understood as affecting residents uniformly, or at least in ungendered ways. This research seeks to engage with the dynamics of a divided city in ways that establish how these conditions contributed to important gendered issues. Gender is a relevant framing for this thesis for a number of reasons. Firstly, it is a factor underrepresented in prior research, as previous work on divided cities adopted an approach that has prioritised an institutional perspective, rather than analysing how aspects of everyday life in these societies marginalises particular groups. Furthermore, divided cities are, in part, structured through fear, which can be disproportionately experienced by women, who often constitute vulnerable individuals in both public and private space due to the threat of (often gendered) violence. This environment is therefore a valuable site to understand the production of fear and its gendered dimensions.
Rationale This study aims to inform the field about the impact that bordered communities have on individual and collective agency (Hewson, 2010:12), and the steps that residents and groups take to develop greater agency. I would argue that too often research on divided cities is conducted and subsequently presented from a top-down perspective that generalises about individuals and homogenises diverse communities, whilst other research focuses on cities from an institutional viewpoint, which typically fails to account for local voices. I would dispute Pullan and Baillie’s assertion that ‘in the academic study of contested cities it is notoriously difficult to find meaningful relationships beyond checklist comparisons’ (2013:2). I therefore intend to capitalise on this void in the academic literature having undertaken an ethnographic study that is immersed in the local environment and gives emphasis to narrative accounts of individuals, thereby attempting to adjust the power relations in favour of residents of divided cities. The difficulties in tackling power relations can be vast and complex, and will be addressed later in the methodology (see Kostovicova et al., 2012; Olesen, 2011), but by basing this study at the ground level, it does at least approach the topic from a less detached perspective than much of the existing literature does. Furthermore, as a natural consequence of having targeted the civil society sphere and gender issues, this thesis will pay particular attention to women’s voices, who can often be underrepresented and unheard in public life in patriarchal societies. Mitrovica’s civil society is an arena in which women have established a leading role, which has developed key objectives like peacebuilding and capacity building. The ability of the NGO community to empower women provides an advantageous basis on which to situate my research, as the research will take guidance from women’s voices that emphasise the prominence of gender issues in the broader societal context in ways that would not be as attainable if speaking to other sectors of society. Civil society, of course, takes a vocal and assertive stance in campaigning for its causes, and does not require assistance in amplifying these voices. However, these individuals and organisations are best placed to identify the state of gender issues in the area of field research, and should thus constitute a central influence on my research.
Marcuse (1993) has stated that walls and fences have become an increasingly central part of everyday life. Therefore, it is fruitful to explore agency in divided cities to learn how individuals regularly have to negotiate and traverse different kinds of borders across urban areas as this becomes more relevant to urban residents worldwide beyond the conflict context. It is entirely plausible that we may begin to see the proliferation of more walled communities or ‘enclaves’ (Nightingale, 2012:9) based on class or race in urban areas, which would represent greater urban fragmentation akin to how divided cities such as Mitrovica function. In a more general sense, I hope this research proves to be valuable in understanding how restrictive forms of public space induce fear, portray threat, and limit agency, particularly among marginalised sections of the community.
Literature Review
This thesis is situated at the intersection of debates regarding gender, divided cities, bordering and the public/private divide. These main bodies of work co-exist and interact broadly within the realms of feminist and political geography, which I intend to explore as a way of identifying existing research in the field. Throughout the proceeding section I will trace the trajectory of leading literature on these topics, both historical and contemporary, identify the gaps in focus and subsequently seek to explore the role that this thesis can play in informing academia. Ultimately, I will argue that literature is sparse at the overlap of the aforementioned topics, but this intersection warrants study due to the inequalities and precarity that these spaces produce. The literature on divided cities and bordering has often failed to take account of gender, as I will proceed to demonstrate, with the public/private debate providing a bridge somewhat between these realms, as interest in the public/private divide has a more established relationship with gender. Divided cities Mitrovica is commonly understood to be part of a collection of cities globally within which populations are segregated along ethnic or faith lines, and border practices are enforced, typically termed ‘divided cities’. Divided cities, as Marcuse (1993) points out, are far from a recent phenomenon, but they can be distinguished in many different ways. Social categories have an impregnable influence on the dynamics of an urban area, both historically and in the contemporary world, as ‘race, class and gender create overlapping patterns of differentiation - invidious differentiation, for there is no doubt that the differences are not simply of ‘lifestyles’ or ‘special needs’, but reflect positions in a hierarchy of power and wealth in which some decided and others are decided for’ (Marcuse, 1993:356). One can therefore see these patterns of differentiation, at times, spatially through urban divisions.
Furthermore, Marcuse outlines seven key new developments in the characteristics of the contemporary city, three of which I believe to be significant in the context of cities divided by conflict. These are:
• ‘The importance which the identity of the quarter has in the lives of its residents: the intensity of turf allegiance.’ • ‘The walls created between quarters, and the intensity with which they are defended: turf barricades and turf battles.’ • ‘The nature of the lines of political conflict and coalition-building: reoriented political cleavages.’ (Marcuse, 1993:358) These points indicate a shift in urban social dynamics towards a more disjointed society with stronger identity ties and allegiances to particular groups and associations. Whilst cities may have had a long history of division along class lines, the more recent developments suggest a more spatially fragmented and overall more privately-oriented society. However, this conceptualisation of the divided cities avows a very structuralist and top-down approach, which understates the multiplicity of contributing factors to social relations, and overlooks the unequal experiences throughout communities. Marcuse neglects to suggest how borders and political lines may function in the alignment of power relations and how power profoundly affects the everyday agency of residents. The fragmentation of space does far more than limit or perpetuate conflict, but rather distinguishes the empowered from the disempowered and the mobile from the immobile. A less structuralist approach to divided cities, which is notably absent in existing literature, would challenge the assumption that populations are uniformly impacted by these divisions.
Pullan and Baillie question whether the city itself is integral to urban conflicts, or whether it functions simply as the lens through which to view the conflict (2013:6). However, as poststructuralist accounts assert, the environment that forms around individuals contributes to the construction of social relations and of multiple identities. Therefore, the conflict cannot be understood as distinct from the city, as the two components are constantly shaping and being re-shaped by each other. Maintaining a focus on the city and its structures is important if one is to break down the causes of conflict to the multitude of factors that mould everyday actions and enforce norms. The application of habitus gives us one leading perspective, which
would maintain that the environment contributes to the conditions of habitus, and thus is a dependent factor for the ways in which the conflict is performed. It is useful, also, to adopt some of the terminology of Pullan and Baillie in noting the regular presence of an ‘urban frontier’ (2013:1) in divided cities, functioning as a boundary point where identities collide. The urban frontier is an important locale to study, as it can often be the singular site for flash points of protest and contestation. This work on urban conflicts also acknowledges that ‘plurality is usually weak or largely rejected’ (Pullan & Baillie, 2013:1). Therefore, boundary points in divided cities represent lone spaces where residents view plurality as a threat to their singular identity and spaces become contested to homogenous communities.
Bordering
One of the favoured arguments of borders being fluid and unstable phenomena could arguably be seen as in conflict to adopting habitus as a theoretical construct that makes sense of durable structures formed from social practices, as the structured versus unstructured dichotomy presents a contradiction. However, academics have increasingly begun to acknowledge the social relations and processes that come to form borders. For example, Jones and Johnson draw the focus away from borders as being dictated by space and time, and towards a modern conceptualisation that incorporates symbolic and social practices of spatial differentiation, therefore rather framing bordering ‘as a socio-spatial process’ (2014:167). Parker and Vaughan-Williams et al. further this idea by calling for a ‘theorising [of] borders as experiences’ (2009:584). This is a useful reference for connecting the study of borders to the theorisation of everyday practices and performances. An acknowledgment of the social element of borders, as opposed to understanding them as purely physical entities, has revitalized border studies, and allowed for a more inclusive reformulation of the border that accounts for borders across all scales and all topographies. In the context of divided cities, this reimagining opens up new ways to theorise the local context, and how social dynamics contribute to an ever-changing landscape. In conjunction with the notion of borders as experiences, borders should also be viewed ‘not only [as] physical but also discursive (Jones & Johnson, 2014:168). This accounts for the everyday tensions and conflicts of divided cities
that regularly influence how borders are constituted, implemented, and experienced. Borderscapes A relatively recent addition to the realm of border studies is a reconceptualisation of the geographies of the border. Academics have increasingly started to address the multidimensionality of borders through the development of the ‘borderscape’ concept, which can be attributed to Suvendrini Perera’s (2007) deployment of Agambenian and Rancièrian politics to conceive the border as an inherent struggle ‘between belonging and non-belonging’ (Kumar Rajaram & Grundy-Warr, 2007:xxviii), which cannot be addressed by the specificity of the conventional understanding of the border. The borderscape is a credible response to these concerns, in being ‘recognizable not in a physical location but tangentially in struggles to clarify inclusion from exclusion’ (ibid: xxviii). I would suggest that this shift in focus from a physical entity to a social and relational reimagining of the border is critical in identifying the contextual complexities that constitute bordered environments. William Kavanagh recalled a quote from an exchange about borders with a friend who stated: “You may remove the door but the doorframe remains” (Sidaway, 2007:161). To him this highlighted the existence of structures around the border itself that fed into socio-cultural processes that serve to comprise an entire landscape. In this regard, attention paid to the border itself, though important, is arguably exaggerated when part of a network of relations and processes. The quote used by Kavanagh, and later deployed by Sidaway, encapsulates the intrinsic social framework that surrounds a border, a framework that is not wholly dependent on the fixity of the border itself. De Certeau has previously claimed that borders’ stability is only an illusion (Kumar Rajaram & Grundy-Warr, 2007:300), thus preempting later work on the socially produced nature of borders themselves. Brambilla has further developed the notion of borderscapes in a way that reflects not just a new perspective on theorising borders, but also a transformation in how borders should be understood strictly in the sense of field research. She states that by identifying and honing attention on the networks of ‘ethnic, social and cultural boundaries’ across the borderscape, we can increase our awareness of the ‘small stories’ (Brambilla, 2015:25) that come from
border experiences in everyday life. This enables a much less distant method of conducting research, deconstructing dominant top-down approaches, and shifting attention towards the border as a ‘perspectival construction’ (Brambilla, 2015:22). This is a timely intervention, as the tendency to view borders from a nation-state level and in terms of sovereignty has perhaps contributed towards a less embedded method of research until now, which has led to the neglect local stories and perspectives. Public/private divide Debates over public and private space will also play a central role in this thesis. Mitchell argues that traditionally ‘public’ spaces like ‘the Greek agora, Romans forums, or 18th-century
German coffeehouses (Habermas 1989) before them, have never simply been places of free unmediated interaction. Rather, they have always also been spaces of exclusion (Fraser 1990; Hartley 1992). The public that met in these spaces was carefully selected and homogeneous in composition (contra Young’s ideal)’ (Mitchell, 2003:131-132). The public forum has a long history of being gendered, as women were regularly restricted to the domestic sphere having ‘been regarded as ‘by nature’ both unsuited to the public realm and rightly dependent on men and subordinated within the family’ (Okin, 1998:118). Klein has argued that it is a frequently adopted tactic for people to manipulate binary oppositions like male/female and public/private ‘to tidy up their mental and discursive worlds’ (Klein, 1995:98). Thus, despite the intricacies and complexities not addressed by binaries, ‘dichotomies of gender are often mapped against other dichotomies including the public-private distinction’ (ibid: 98). The complexities that I allude to highlight an extension of the public/private debate contention; how ‘public’ space is dependent on a range of factors like class, gender and race. Public and private space are therefore much more fluid concepts than the binary into which they are categorised suggests. This point has been increasingly emphasised in feminist analysis that has stressed how ‘public and private interconnect differently in the lives of those of different classes, ethnicities, races, ages and so on’ (Bondi, 1998:161; see also Gamarnikow et al., 1983). Space cannot be considered public if particular demographics are restricted in their ability to enact agency in urban spaces, instead performing an exclusionary role. In the context of divided cities, this means that, depending on the severity of division, swathes of urban space are not truly public. Residents must overcome rigidly entrenched social
boundaries to traverse the city, beyond the personal agency that they hold. Whilst current research focusing on the privatisation of urban space in terms of commercial investment is one important branch of this debate, academics should not neglect the socio-cultural privatisation of public space that is an everyday experience for residents of divided cities, and could be an increasingly prominent concern for those in many other cities internationally.
Theoretical Background
I will base this thesis in a theoretical context that informs the empirical findings of my research in order to make sense of the everyday performances and gendered patterns from a sociological perspective. The chosen theories are designed to find significance in my analysis and draw conclusions from participants’ accounts whilst reflecting on the innate behaviours I observed during field research. As the thesis incorporates aspects of human behaviour and gender, theories will be diverse, and I will endeavour to interweave both of these aspects at times when gender issues intersect with the everyday practices of individuals. Habitus Three main theories critically inform this thesis and provide the grounding for this thesis. Pierre Bourdieu’s notion of habitus is central in making sense of the practices and processes that arise from everyday actions. Bourdieu defines habitus as ‘a particular class of conditions of existence [that] produce…systems of durable, transposable dispositions, structured structures predisposed to function as structuring structures, that is as principles which generate and organize practices and representations’ (Bourdieu, 1990:53). These structures are both historically enforced, and self-reinforcing, as they are built on a set of environmental conditions that have been moulded by social practices and, in turn, consequently shape social practices. The fact that habitus is, by its very nature, engrained in everyday life, means that it ‘[transcends] subjective intentions and conscious projects, whether individual or collective’ (Bourdieu, 1990:58). The reference to both individual and collective intentions is critical, as individuals act beneath the level of conscious thought, as they are influenced by their cultural milieu. Yet the conditions that create such a milieu are, in part, a construction of two levels of previous behaviour, both individual and collective. Thus, both the individual and the collective inform each other and maintain the status of habitus. The process is informed and influenced by historical thought and performance, yet habitus becomes instinctive, involving the forgetting of external conditions to reconstitute behaviour as natural and unaffected or unbounded by the external environment, thereby providing a valuable theoretical tool for examining individuals’ awareness of societal norms and their implications. As Bourdieu
explains, ‘the habitus – embodied history, internalized as a second nature and so forgotten as history – is the active presence of the whole past of which it is the product’ (Bourdieu, 1990:56). This theory will complement border work that emphasises the contribution of social processes to the reinforcement and porosity of the border, as habitus can manifest physically on the urban scale. A border, itself a structure, can therefore perform the role of dictating everyday actions and interactions in a divided city. Agency Intimately intertwined with habitus according to some accounts is the notion of agency, which is integral to the understanding of the human experience. Agency is conceptualised through three forms - individual, proxy, and collective (Hewson, 2010:12) – and is seen to be constructed through three main properties – intentionality, power, and rationality (ibid: 13). Agency accounts for the element of human behaviour that is conscious and calculated, as opposed to the ‘aimless, accidental, or unconscious’ realm of behaviour that also constitutes everyday actions (ibid: 13). Individuals’ freedom can therefore be partially determined by one’s capacity to make unrestricted and calculated decisions and choices, which is somewhat representative of an individual’s positioning in society, or more specifically, society’s willingness to allow them freedom. This is reflective of the postmodernist turn for studies of agency, which places power in the hands of ‘discourse or knowledge that flows throughout society as capillaries flow blood through a body’ (ibid: 15). The Foucauldian approach exhibited here places individuals within a framework of social relations that compose the everyday environment, thus theorising agency as an aspect of human behaviour out of the control of the individual. Furthermore, Emirbayer and Mische have emphasised the temporalities of agency, stating that the concept is ‘informed by the past (in its “iterational” or habitual aspect) but also oriented toward the future (as a “projective” capacity to imagine alternative possibilities) and toward the present (as a “practical-evaluative” capacity to contextualize past habits and future projects within the contingencies of the moment)’ (1998:962). I would argue that this conceptualisation of agency gives too much weighting to the ‘”projective” capacity’ element, which exaggerates the individual’s control over their own capacity to improve their position of freedom within society. Agency, with regard to habitus, the production of structured systems, is heavily informed by the past, another factor that
Emirbayer and Mische address. It is therefore this historical context that shapes and moulds agency, as it creates the paths and actions that become ‘habitual, repetitive, and taken for granted’ (ibid: 963) that are understood by the “theorists of practice.” It is important to acknowledge the temporalities of agency whilst simultaneously the inherent limitations for individuals to reimagine their future. This is a particularly pertinent theory to apply to this case, as post-conflict divided cities are intimately structured through past behaviour as the norms from wartime are maintained physically and institutionally. Gender & space Gender’s relationship to space forms the second key frame in which to situate this study. In the same way that habitus represents the performance of a process of repetitive acts, gender is a performed and enacted construct (Butler, 1988) that possesses spatialities. Spaces and spheres are therefore defined in terms of ‘masculine’ or ‘feminine’, as feminist theory has continually argued, while acknowledging that there have been ‘strong pressures exerted on women to physically restrict themselves to the domestic aspects of cities and urban life’ (McDowell, 1983:59). Such work has long called for focus to be placed not on ‘women alone, but rather the structure of social relations that contributes to female oppression’ (McDowell, 1983:59), thus calling for an appreciation of the social environment that shapes gender identities. This perspective works in complement to a poststructural understanding of space and social relations, as applying this approach to gender unfolds relations to inform how a layering of identities contributes to the social environment. Massey furthered the relationship between gender and space in arguing that:
‘From the symbolic meaning of spaces/places and the clearly gendered messages which they transmit, to straightforward exclusion by violence, spaces and places are not only themselves gendered but, in their being so, they both reflect and affect the ways in which gender is constructed and understood. The limitation of women’s mobility, in terms both of identity and space, has been in some cultural contexts a crucial means of subordination.’ (Massey, 1994:179).
This traces a long history of theorising space, which has seen the private sphere conceived as the ‘domestic’, and thus ‘men are assumed to be chiefly preoccupied with and responsible for the occupations of the sphere of economic and political life, and women with those of the private sphere of domesticity and reproduction’ (Phillips, 1998:118). But as Massey alludes to, in conjunction with the ‘ownership’ of space, is also an acceptance that freedom of movement through space is additionally impacted by the gendering of space. This thesis therefore asserts that the intersection between gender, space and agency, particularly in the setting of a nationalistically-charged society, is a fruitful and understudied position from which to frame this research. Geographies of fear Alongside debates about gender and space are pervading issues of gender-based violence and the geographies of fear. Geographies of fear and their contingent causes further contribute to spatial exclusion. This is sometimes collectively referred to under the term of ‘behavioural geography’ (Koskela, 1999:112). However, Koskela claims that this field ‘is based on naïve assumptions about individuals and society – that human spatial behaviour is ‘determined by preference only’ (Rushton, 1969, in Tivers, 1984, p. 84). Such simplistic arguments are far from the social reality of gender, violence and fear’ (Koskela, 1992:112). Similarly, Koskela’s argument draws on the enactment of habitus spatially, whilst the argument of preference conflicts with the notion that individual and collective actions are enacted repetitively to the point where these actions become innate, rather than as part of a process of conscious decision-making. Behavioural geography, in the form to which Koskela refers, also fails to account for agency’s identification with the ‘self-actional notion of “human will”’ (Emirbayer, 1997:294), as the structures entrenched in the environment erode the preference, human will, and therefore, agency, of those who are spatially excluded. Issues like gendered violence and street harassment serve only to reinforce these actions in the lifeworlds of victims, leading to the actions going beyond any conception of being solely preference-based. The behaviours that enforce these structures will partially form the subject of attention for this research.
Blöbaum and Hunecke have applied concepts of ‘entrapment’ (2005:480) and ‘hotspots of fear’ (ibid:481) in this context as ways of explaining how fear is configured spatially, whilst helping to emphasise that gendered fear is unevenly distributed across space. These hotspots are dependent on perceptions of individual security and vulnerability, which are influenced by a range of local social and environmental factors. As Gill Valentine notes in her seminal article on the gendered geographies of fear, ‘the association of male violence with certain environmental contexts has a profound effect on many women’s use of space (1989:385). Furthermore, Wesely and Gaarder (2004) suggest that the implicit threat of violence through street harassment represents a rejection of women from the masculine public sphere, thus highlighting how non-violent forms of abuse can have an equally detrimental effect on the production of fear and on the gendering of space. Feminist nationalism
The term ‘feminist nationalism’ is a concept that has been introduced into academic discussion in recent years (West, 1997) as a critique of classical literature on nationalism that overlooks its ‘inherently “gendered”’ nature (West, 1997:xiv). To many traditional theorists, the idea of feminist nationalism is oxymoronic, as struggles within nationalism ‘have not been analyzed for how they are gendered – created through processes of the construction of male status hierarchies, male bonding, homosociality/homosexuality, and so on’ (West, 1997:xiv). In other terms, the masculine constructions of nationalism have not been recognised for what they are, and consequently, the role of women within nationalism has not been addressed. This has profound implications for societies where nationalist ideologies influence individual and group attitudes, as these influences produce gendered power relations that become structures of daily life. Feminist nationalism provokes debates about inclusion and exclusion, as predominant understandings about nationalism largely overlook female roles and characters, which can contribute to the reinforcement of female exclusion from the public sphere.
Methodology The following section introduces the research methods adopted for the purpose of this thesis, along with justifications where appropriate to outline the process behind the fieldwork. The methodological framework was designed to test my research question that focused on the possible connection between gender and the borderscape in the most effective manner by positioning oneself within the environment and using local voices to direct the research. I will proceed to expose these methods and their significance in the following chapter, through embedding them within the existing research literature and demonstrating their contextual application. The aim of this thesis was, in part, to analyse accounts of individual and collective agency in Mitrovica in order to examine how the structure of a divided city affects residents’ everyday practices in ways that may be gendered. The research topic that I have outlined requires a specific methodological perspective in order to most effectively reflect on individual notions of agency as a lens through which to view daily lived experiences in Mitrovica. As already stressed, there has been an underutilisation of methods that adopt a view of divided cities from the perspective of everyday lived experiences, rather taking a more distanced standpoint.
I endeavoured to deploy ethnographic research techniques that adopted a locally embedded position and bridged the connection between human interaction and the environment that they inhabit. Such a method also promotes a geographical outlook, which facilitates a more nuanced understanding from a spatial perspective regarding the freedom or limitation of movement and the significance of contested spaces. More generally, this undertaking represents a more reflexive approach to social science, which Burawoy states, ‘starts out from dialogue, virtual or real, between observer and participants, embeds such dialogue within a second dialogue between local processes and extralocal forces that in turn can only be comprehended through a third, expanding dialogue of theory with itself’ (1998:5). ‘Reflexivity’, a notion introduced by Hammersley & Atkinson (1995) is critical to a study of this nature in order to minimize the extent to which I, as the researcher and interviewer, am
influencing the proceedings, for ‘the researcher is part of the social world he or she studies’ (Maxwell, 2012:90). There are undoubtedly dangers in approaching an environment of which one has no prior experience and potentially forcing a premeditated narrative upon participants, particularly when focusing on often sensitive topics like gender issues. Throughout the process, I tried to be conscious not to impose my own opinion upon interviewees, as I was in a privileged yet uninformed position to be passing judgment. Olesen addressed the concern among feminist researchers of ‘replicating oppression and privilege’ (Olesen, 2011:135), as increasing emphasis has been assigned to voice in various forms to re-adjust these power relations through methods such as ‘voice-centered relational methods’, ‘reconstructed research narratives’, ‘writing the less powerful voices’, or ‘presenting versions of voices’ (ibid:136), yet ultimately the power remains with those who produce the text from the voices. The notion of dialogue, however, is important, as I hoped for much of my initial research to constitute a dialogic engagement, rather than relying on more structured forms of interviewing. Kostovicova et al. have explored the role of dialogic interviewing in the field of human security as a way of achieving a more equal and power-sharing method of research, as ‘dialogue permits recognition of the agential power of the researched in the construction of knowledge of human security, as well as providing insights into the complexity of lived experiences of insecurity’ (2012:571). However, this account still vastly oversimplifies the effect that dialogic interviewing can have on evening out the power relations between interviewer and interviewee. This perspective places too much emphasis on speech as an indicator of power and thus fails to acknowledge the socio-cultural context that surrounds ethnographic research. Greater time and freedom may be granted to participants to express themselves vocally but this remains a grossly superficial measure of power relations, as serving as a valuable interviewee typically requires opening oneself up to judgment and placing oneself in a position of vulnerability. With regard to research, one must therefore look beyond method that focuses too heavily on speech and speech acts. Wright-Mills argued that: ‘the most admirable scholars within the scholarly community … do not split their work
from their lives. They seem to take both too seriously to allow such dissociation, and they want to use each for the enrichment of the other’ (1959:195).
Taking this idea as a starting point, one can also extend the claim to state that the most effective research is conducted when research is not thought of an extension of everyday life, but as a constitutive part of it. If academics think about research in the same ways in which they view their own life, they can begin to make deeper connections between themselves and their own participants. One commonly deployed step to bridging the divide between research and everyday life is to conduct certain forms of participant observation. As Jorgensen outlines, participant observation is appropriate for select contexts, namely in which ‘the research problem is concerned with human meanings and interactions viewed from the insiders’ perspective’ or ‘the phenomenon of investigation is observable within an everyday life situation or setting’ (1989:13). As aspects of the research are indeed focused on observable phenomena – for example, street harassment and the performance of agency in public space – this method served as a crucial complementary technique to the primary method of interviewing. However, while not dissociating one’s life from research, it is similarly important to ‘gain as far as possible an internal perspective on the studied field and to systematize the status of the stranger at the same time’ (Flick, 2014: 229) in order to avoid what is termed ‘going native’. Maintaining a distance from the observed facilitates a greater sense of self-reflection that allows for a more nuanced understanding of the contextual implications of participants’ behaviour. This raises a recurring concern that placing too much emphasis on participant observation leads to me, as the researcher, assuming the role of the local, rather than attributing just importance to participants. Thus, the role of participant observation should not be overstated.
The research for this thesis was conducted during a three-week stay in Mitrovica during April 2016. Field research consisted of a combination of twelve extensive interviews and focus groups with NGO staff, local students from the International Business College Mitrovica (IBCM), and police advisors, as well as participant observation in public space and at an NGO-led activist event. I chose to approach this thesis with an emphasis on civil society, as this sector has a stronger awareness of gender issues and could therefore direct the topic of my research towards the most prominent matters faced by Mitrovica’s society. I interviewed
seventeen participants in total, and deployed both interviews and focus groups depending on the context and the participants. For example, focus groups were more conducive to extracting responses from students, as the format provided a more encouraging setting for voicing opinions. From a practical perspective that emphasises the everyday fear in the environment, some students would have had reservations about participating in an interview alone, because of the fear associated in crossing the city alone, which is not an act regularly practised by some students. Therefore, I concluded it was a priority to create an inviting atmosphere for more vulnerable participants, which enabled students to contribute more willingly. This is not just a contextual case, but rather a central tenet of focus group usage (Longhurst, 2010). I had concerns that this may be offset by bias generated by the influence of other participants on each other, that is to say ‘problems often arise due to … the difficulties of … identifying the opinions and views of the individual group members within the dynamics’ (Flick, 2014:202). However, despite not being among the premeditated research techniques I intended to deploy, in the context, these focus groups still produced contrasting opinions and extensive discussion within the groups, as participants were familiar with each other socially and thus felt comfortable enough in the environment to vocalise their views and open up about their personal experiences. Confidentiality is a common concern when integrating focus groups in research design, but the format in this experience stimulated participants to be more forthcoming because of the presence of other trusted personnel around them. My intention to focus heavily on civil society as a source of participants seemed like the most appropriate decision practically, as these individuals are more accessible, and they are in a stronger position to use their voices to represent sections of the local population. However, similarly, these individuals possess much greater agency than many whom they are speaking on behalf of, as a consequence of working in an educated and pluralistic sector. One must therefore acknowledge that the breadth of this study is limited, as the groups to which this thesis will often refer are being, to some extent, homogenised by not possessing their own voice within the research. Field research can often feel inherently exploitative, which therefore serves as one of the key limitations of a study such as this.
Community Building Mitrovica (CBM), NGO Aktiv, Advocacy Center for Democratic Culture (ACDC), Synergy and D&G Solutions. These were among the most accessible organisations, whilst also being at the forefront of Mitrovica’s dense civil society network, which is particularly vibrant, since Mitrovica’s status as a politically contested and ethnically divided city makes it a magnet for international donor funding and civil society projects. This undoubtedly facilitated my access to research participants, making Mitrovica an advantageous site for research. I was also able to establish contact with some of International Business College Mitrovica’s (IBCM) students in addition to the city’s NGO staff. However, this again was the result of engagement with the NGO network, as the college’s establishment was, in part, funded by Dutch NGO, SPARK, which is no longer operating in the city. I interviewed seven students in total from both the North and South campuses of the college. The internationally-minded and bilingual students at the business college undoubtedly represent a relatively select portion of the city’s youth, which has its limitations as a form of ‘sampling bias’ (Bryman, 2015:173). However, this in itself was an interesting point of research, providing I was self-aware of this bias, as I could question participants to reflect comparatively on their attitudes and experiences in relation to those of their peers at other educational institutions or from other social backgrounds. This revealed the significant and profound impact that higher education can have, as well as how internationally-oriented education espouses more pluralistic attitudes. By integrating comparative questions into my research design, I hope to have adequately recognised and addressed the existing bias.
The research design was arranged so as to transition from semi-structured interviews towards a more structured approach as the research topic became more targeted and refined, forming a ‘triangulation’ mechanism of ‘multi-methods research’ (Clifford et al., 2010:106). This is based on the assertion that an effective thesis requires a design where structure complements fluidity and interpretation. Semi-structured interviews are ‘conversational and informal’ (ibid:105) in nature, and in this research performed the role of building a framework on which to base the bulk of the thesis, through highlighting key themes, broad patterns and trends by using the findings of the interviews as a form of comparison. The themes that had been highlighted by initial participants could subsequently serve as the points of focus for later interviews, whereby I could compare the experiences of participants with the issues identified. For example, earlier interviewees from NGOs emphasised the prevalence of street
harassment, which led me to frame later interview designs partially around this topic. As Bryman outlines, analysis of interviews through grounded theory raises ‘concepts’, ‘categories’, ‘properties’ and ‘hypotheses’ (Bryman, 2015:575-576), which could then be used to inform the resultant observational and structured interview research on agency, tracing out a path for further inquiry. Structured interviews themselves can also function in a comparative manner, though. By initially implementing this form of researching, whilst building upon them with participant observation, I was able to test how participants’ theories espoused match up against their theories-in-use, therefore comparing perception with reality (Argyris, 1976). This is crucial in the context of a thesis that deploys habitus as a theoretical tool, as its manifestation is inherently non-representational (Bourdieu, 1990) and is characterised by subconscious actions that individuals are allude explanation. This technique therefore enabled me, as the observer, to analyse and critically reflect on the agency that individuals and groups enact, since habitus is not a concept which people demonstrate self-awareness of. Yet, my role as an individual detached from these practices of everyday life in this environment put me in an advantageous position to reflect on these actions.
Empirical findings and analysis
The analysis of this research has been categorised into several key themes that emerged during the course of the fieldwork. I will draw on the aforementioned theoretical framework to interpret the individual accounts of gender issues in the divided city and develop a series of consistent narratives that emerged from my participants. Geographies of fear will constitute one of the overarching themes for this thesis, which is present throughout the main issues that were uncovered, and will thus be a reference point across my chapters of analysis. The respective chapters will loosely centre on the prevalence of domestic violence, street harassment and female public participation. Other than the geographies of fear, the interconnected theories of habitus and agency will also form overlapping themes as ways of understanding the status of these gender issues. The intersection of geographies of fear and gender issues Divided cities are often socially structured through fear, which is utilised on a widespread political level to instil existing relations and maintain the status quo of division and avoidance. However, although the production of fear may be exercised universally, the ways in which it is produced for and experienced by different groups are profoundly unequal.
Within the realm of gender issues in Mitrovica, an inadequate provision of resources for domestic violence victims has been consistently identified as one of the most significant concerns. Marija Stanković, of NGO Aktiv, pinpointed the absence of a safe house for domestic violence victims in North Mitrovica as part of a structure of ‘institutional discrimination’ against the Serbian community in Kosovo (Interview with Marija Stankovic, 6th
April 2016). The Center for Protection of Women and Children in Mitrovica “Raba Voca”, located on Mitrovica’s Albanian-dominated South side, serves ‘women, girls and children of all ethnicities and races regardless of their religion or political orientation’ and ‘victims and people who need it from all parts of Kosovo’ (Interview with Emine Kabashi, 17th April 2016).
Although the facility is designed to accommodate all women, Marija highlighted the profound, multi-layered psychological barriers that prevent free and unburdened access, describing victims’ concerns as ‘not only … a safety issue, but more of a judgment issue’. Thus, the reality of the climate of fear is that it restricts victims’ agency and limits the shelter’s accessibility, highlighting the configuration of spatialised fear (Blöbaum & Hunecke, 2005). This pertinently encapsulates how the structures of the divided setting are intimately bound up with feelings of fear, marginalisation, and victimisation. The task of travelling from the North to the South side of the river forces vulnerable groups into breaking from social norms and structures, thus disturbing the habitus that maintains physical and social divisions. The circumstances underscore the precarity that these individuals experience insofar as ‘even in this kind of situation when life is jeopardised, [victims] do not feel comfortable to go [to the safe house]’ (Interview with Marija Stanković, 6th April 2016). As Valentine asserts, a woman’s experience of space and ‘perception of her safety’ is closely related to the familiarity of ‘her social and physical surroundings’ (1989:388). Thus, accessing unfamiliar parts of town compounds the experience of fear based on the layered production of fear from both the domestic and perceived public threats. This is an experience that is distinct to the vulnerable group of domestic violence victims in the divided city. Spatial identities Space and place is socially constructed and bounded by a multiplicity of identities that form the environments of everyday encounters. These social constructs affect perceptions and therefore how people interact and experience space. Like individuals, spaces can hold a plurality of identities that are open to interpretation by different groups. In Mitrovica, there is a perception within Serbian society, and even pluralistic arenas like the NGO sector, that Albanian society is more ‘traditional’ and insular (Interview with Miodrag Marinkovic, 8th April 2016), that ‘men are the main part of the family’, women ‘don’t have too many rights in some places’ (Interview with Serbian IBCM students, 13th April 2016), and that ‘Albanian and Serbian communities are very, very different’ (Interview with Zeljko Virijević, 11th April 2016),
which could be attributed to a closer influence of religion on society. All of these factors mould an identity of South Mitrovica as foreign, restrictive and alien to outsiders, constituting a form of Othering. In the context of gender issues, this can pose additional psychological
barriers to marginalised and threatened individuals. For domestic violence victims, who are overwhelmingly female (Interview with Stefan Veljković, 14th April 2016), their experiences represent an assertion that they should be restricted to the private sphere, and that the public sphere remains beyond their capacity. Accessing the city’s shared victim facilities therefore requires a move into public space, and into the ‘foreign’, ‘Albanian’ space, serving as an additionally traumatising obstacle to resources. The south of Mitrovica is portrayed as threatening and unfamiliar to these individuals, both through being public and ‘Albanian’. By situating resources in an environment where geographies of fear profoundly affect movement, those who experience fear in the private sphere are consequently subject to further perceptions of threat and danger in the public sphere. In this respect, it could be argued that gender in Mitrovica is intimately bound by these emotions, and threat, fear and danger are in part responsible for the production of gender in this environment. Butler argues that ‘gender performances…are governed by more clearly punitive and regulatory social conventions’ (1988:527). Thus, the structural role of fear constitutes a governing convention in gender’s construction, and is deeply engrained in women’s experiences of both public and private space. Domestic violence across the borderscape In response to these concerns, international police advisors suggested that increasing the capacity and improving the quality and accessibility of a single shelter should be prioritised, as providing an extra shelter for victims in North Mitrovica politicises the issue (Interview with international police advisors, 13th April 2016). Whilst there are instances where dividing institutions along ethnic lines can be seen as wrongly legitimising separation, failing to accommodate vulnerable and marginalised individuals risks institutionalising an acceptance of domestic violence as well as underestimating the lack of agency that victims possess in seeking aftercare. Given limitations on funding, there is a justifiable argument for strengthening the security and accessibility to a single shelter. As one police advisor argued, ‘More money in a good thing [is better] than a lot of money in two bad things’. Effectively facilitating the personal safety of victims from all backgrounds at the current safe house and generating a climate that transcends ethnic boundaries would serve as a valuable step towards breaking down the geographies of fear that hinder victim aftercare. Evidence
overwhelmingly suggested that ‘domestic violence has no border’ (Interview with international police advisors, 13th April 2016), but rather is a universal problem experienced by all of Mitrovica’s communities. Therefore, responses to domestic violence should not be plagued by the same divisive measures that characterise much of the city’s other institutional and daily structures. It is important to view domestic violence as a structural problem in Mitrovica rather than a cultural issue exclusive to one community or the other, as the borderscape can subsequently be viewed more fluidly and porous rather than a static point at which experiences diverge. To borrow the terminology of Anssi Paasi, ‘rather than neutral lines, borders are often pools of emotions, fears and memories that can be mobilized apace for progressive and regressive purposes’ (Johnson et al, 2011:62). As a result, practitioners can adopt a holistic approach to domestic violence responses that captures the importance of the border not as a delimiting structure for experiences but more as a psychological barrier that must be challenged to provide equal access to all communities. This research also revealed that some participants still don’t consider domestic violence to be a significant problem in Mitrovica’s society to some, even among those in the NGO sphere. Milos Golubović stated, ‘I don’t think that domestic violence is that much of a problem here than for example if you take Pristina or Belgrade, like capital cities. This is a small city. If you are violent to your wife, people will hear and then you will be removed from society somehow’ (Interview, 16th April 2016). However, this notion that a tight-knit community
would castigate perpetrators of domestic violence into negating the practice as an issue places too much emphasis on victims’ capacity to report violence, and fails to acknowledge how the restriction of violence to the private sphere can limit the possibility of awareness reaching the public sphere. This opinion is in opposition to recent civil society studies that have identified that domestic violence is experienced by at least one in three women in Mitrovica (Interview with Marija Stanković, 6th April 2016). The perception among young
people outside of the NGO community is that ‘rates of domestic violence are decreasing, because women are gaining independence financially, women are getting their education [and] men are getting their education and understanding real values of a woman’ (Interview with IBCM South students, 11th April 2016). More historical reports of domestic violence are
less well recorded, so domestic violence may be decreasing as women’s public participation becomes more common. However, these opinions could also be attributed to the persistence
of the taboo status that domestic violence suffers from in public discourse, which means awareness continues to be limited. Marija Stanković noted that:
‘It was very hard for people to really speak about [domestic violence during the survey]. So we had really different answers when it comes to “How many cases of domestic violence have you witnessed?” The number was extremely high, and when we asked the question, “Did you experience domestic violence?” The answer was always no.’ (Interview, 6th April 2016).
The unwillingness of women to identify domestic violence even in an anonymous survey highlights the difficulties in overcoming the taboo culture that continues to pervade society in Mitrovica, perhaps for fear of repercussions, or due to an inherent acceptance of subordination to male members of the household. This interpretation could also be extracted from the research, as despite the prevalence of domestic violence, most women still saw their position in the family as a positive one. Miodrag Marinković suggested that:
‘There’s a pressure of the community to accept the family values, which actually derives from the traditional role of traditional gender division of roles … and this is considered to be a very safe and valued position, so many women assume this role as something that is actually positive. They don’t have any reference, in that sense, to something different.’ (Interview, 8th April 2016). It could thus be argued that an increase in women’s public participation is central to reshaping dominant attitudes of gender roles and so-called traditional values. I would, however, suggest that the environment of a divided city is not overly conducive to facilitating a progression of gender roles, as young post-conflict societies tend to be still highly male-dominated for a number of reasons. Firstly, women’s issues are often side-lined as a priority by state actors, who view them fundamentally as of secondary importance to state-building and peacebuilding, rather than being in complementarity. Therefore, gender equality is not advanced and women’s issues are left behind with the progression of post-conflict society. Furthermore, as an extension of wartime attitudes, society is built on threat and danger. There can be a lingering impression of public spaces being aggressive and hostile
environments, which can target women disproportionately, contributing to an enduring masculinisation of society. Blöbaum and Hunecke have termed this ‘the paradox between locations of fear and violence’ (2005:467), as there is a disparity between where women consider themselves threatened, and where violence against women is most commonly committed. There is, however, a complex relationship between women’s avoidance of public spaces and their risk of violence in the domestic realm (Valentine, 1992), as ‘overemphasis of the risk of assault in public space is said to discourage women from entering the feared public space’, and such avoidance of public space subsequently increases the chance of being victim to domestic violence (Blöbaum & Hunecke, 2005:467). The distribution of fear can therefore strongly restrict the public role of women in post-conflict societies. Summary
This section has attempted to demonstrate the inter-relationship between gender and division, in the sense that the effects of divided communities are profoundly gendered, and gender issues are intimately bound up in the societal division in which they are situated. The practical implications of the divided society are illustrated through the microcosm of domestic violence facilities. Resources that are constricted to one side of Mitrovica are often viewed as inaccessible to other communities due to the structures of fear and segregation that are in place. This is particularly problematic in the context of domestic violence, as victims constitute society’s precariat, and are thus situated in inherently vulnerable positions that make bridging borders a deeply traumatic experience. This example fundamentally establishes a case for divided cities and borders to be seen as gendered phenomena that affect individuals in ways that have not previously been considered, and that fear and threat are inherently bound up in the construction of gender.
Street harassment, agency, and geographical and cultural distinctions In this chapter I aim to draw links between the notion of fear, agency and habitus, while situating street harassment within this theoretical framework to comprehend the processes that contribute to its structural role in public space, as well as analysing its profoundly gendered impacts through this theoretical lens. I will begin by reintroducing some of the theory and then proceed to illustrate my participants’ accounts along these thematic lines. I intend to demonstrate that street harassment is part of the construction of fear in the city, which reinforces the structures that maintain division and contribute to a significant gendering of public space. Street harassment, as an experience, induces fear of the spaces in which it is performed, and as a compound phenomenon, this fear ties in with the perception of threat and judgment that proliferates across the borderscape environment. Fear, space and place As a wealth of existing literature has already widely addressed, fear is unevenly distributed throughout populations, as well as being highly spatialised. For example, Koskela states that:
‘Women’s decisions concerning the routes they choose and places they go to are modified by the threat of violence. In identifying safe routes and dangerous areas, women formulate different spaces: the city – especially the night city – is divided into ‘masculine’ areas, with barely any women around, and presumably safer areas which fearful women find more ‘feminine’’ (Koskela, 1999:112). This fear, or sometimes simply unease, is in part inflected by experiences of harassment, that can create ‘a different social reality’ for women (Koskela, 1999:116-117). In addition to gendered violence, street harassment was identified throughout my research in Mitrovica as a deeply engrained experience of public life within sections of society. As I will proceed to argue, these experiences can have subtle but profound impacts on individuals’ relationships with their environment.
Students described frequent cases of harassment in areas familiar to them throughout Mitrovica. Zana Syla, from CBM, identified cat-calling specifically as a ‘very usual’ phenomenon (Interview, 7th April 2016), while IBCM students also noted the frequency of street harassment. Arbenita Zeneli, from the business college, suggested it was ‘a matter of mentality of people’ that ‘when we walk down the street, you can see a lot of men sexually harassing women’ (Interview with IBCM South students, 11th April 2016). This connects with how Marija Stanković, at NGO Aktiv, stated that ‘everything is linked to the perception of women in society’ (Interview, 6th April 2016). The prevalence of harassment has led to a
culture of tolerance whereby acceptance is viewed as the primary coping mechanism. Its prevalence could be a contributing factor in the practice not being viewed as a gender issue (Interview with Zana Syla, 7th April 2016). There are frequent difficulties in drawing attention
to gender issues like street harassment because they have reached a status of ‘normality’, making it ‘very hard to change and educate the feeling about requiring their own rights’ (Interview with Zana Syla, 7th April 2016). The ‘normality’ to which Zana refers is evidence of
the centrality of habitus insofar as behaviours become structural through a process of historical enforcement and self-reinforcement, leaving performances like street harassment deeply embedded in the everyday experiences of public space. Though one could not claim that street harassment has gained the status of becoming ‘unconscious’ (Bourdieu, 1990:56), but the factors that lead to its rise have been dispensed of, and the interrelation between the act and its influences have become severed. Street harassment and spatialised agency Victims of street harassment are consequently less likely to acknowledge how this treatment could subconsciously restrict their agency - agency that could influence how individuals perceive borders and their freedom of movement in traversing their environment alone. Emirbayer noted that agency is ‘situationally embedded’, while ‘[signifying] modes of response to problems impinging upon it through sometimes broad expanses of time as well as space’ (1997:294). It is therefore important to situate any debates about agency within a contextual framework, which in this case will be outlined through the discussion of public space and street harassment. One must consequently note that because of the fluid and
