A kilometre of power: gender, mobility, and measurement in São Paulo

Abstract

This thesis explores how concepts like gender and mobility are operationalised in the São Paulo Origin Destination survey (SPOD), how feminist research can work within these kinds of operationalisations, and what that process tells us about the value of data-intensive methods for gender-sensitive research and planning. It is based on leveraging empirical, quantitative methods within a critical feminist framework to identify the strengths and limitations of quantitative approaches to gender mobility research. The text is subdivided into four chapters, which iteratively develop a framework for the use and critique of quantitative gender mobility work. The first chapter explains the theoretical foundations of the thesis, as well as exploring the context within which the SPOD is produced and used. The second chapter makes use of statistical matching techniques to empirically determine the costs of identifying gender-based effects on mobility without a theory of gender. The third chapter builds on the previous chapter by making use of geometric data analysis to describe gender-based mobility differences within an intersectional framework. The fourth chapter places these results within a wider intersectional context, and emphasises the importance of considering broader epistemic inequalities when doing critical quantitative work. As a whole, this thesis contributes to the quantitative mobilities, transport justice, and feminist data science literatures by providing a worked example of critical, empirical work within the limitations of extant data regimes.