Leslie Kern: “The lockdowns have brought a whole new lens on our cities”

“We have this beast called the economy… this rarefied concept that we just throw out there, and we’ve forgotten everything that underpins it,” says author and academic Leslie Kern.

“What is this economy that we are so hung up on saving, and what are we willing to risk or sacrifice in the name of this thing, this ‘economy’?”

Kern’s book Feminist City came out over a year ago. While it was written long before the pandemic, she admits the Covid health crisis and its lockdowns have drawn a whole new audience to Kern’s provocations for a more equitable city.

In her talk at the Festival of Place, now available as a podcast, Kern illuminates the “shaky foundations” on which our economy rests.

Listen to Leslie Kern’s talk

“The crisis has revealed that our social safety nets are full of holes and that care work is in crisis,” Kern says. “What has been hidden has come to the forefront.”

The economy relies on free or poorly-paid care work, Kern says, a sector that has been deliberately devalued and hidden away in our cities and homes.

“We heavily rely on unpaid and underpaid work to keep society functioning, and much of this work is done by women, lower income people, racial minorities, recent immigrants… It’s stigmatised, it’s devalued and kept out of sight and out of mind.

“Care work has been an afterthought in design,” says Kern. “It’s not reflected in the city infrastructure.”

“What is this economy that we are so hung up on saving, and what are we willing to risk or sacrifice in the name of this thing, this ‘economy’?”

By pointing out how care work is poorly served financially, socially and in physical environments, such as the architecture of cities and transportation networks,

“The struggle to make the necessities of care, whether that’s feeding people, getting them to healthcare, looking after children… we haven’t created a robust infrastructure for care. It’s very much an afterthought or tucked away and hidden in the space of the home

Which brings Kern to another revelation – how our homes fail us.

“Reimagining the home and the family is critical,” argues Kern. “We know that the home is not a safe space. This traditional nuclear family structure is under more pressure than ever before, it’s just not particularly effective for many people to live the life they want to live. How can we as mediators of cities support other notions of what home and the family look like?”

“How can we as mediators of cities support other notions of what home and the family look like?”