This small Swedish town near the Arctic Circle is at the forefront of gender equality and integrates it into its urban planning.
In Sweden, one city prides itself on being the most feminist in the country: Umeå, a small university town 300 km from the Arctic Circle. The municipality has been thinking for more than 25 years about the place of women in the public space, and integrates gender equality into its urban planning projects.
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It is not the equestrian statue of a king that overlooks the large square in the city center of Umeå, but a puma, visibly angry: “This is the first, and a priori the only work of art in the world that has been commissioned by a city to celebrate the #MeToo movement, smiles Linda Gustafsson, responsible for gender equality at the town hall, a position that has existed since 1989. The body of the feline is very powerful, painted in bright red, it roars, sitting on its cage. The work is called ‘Listen’. This is her message: listen and believe women when they tell you about abuse and violence.”
Feminism is integrated into urban planning
She then takes us to see a pedestrian tunnel, under the station, where women were assaulted ten years ago: “The old tunnel was very narrow and dark, it was scary…” Very quickly, it will be destroyed to be completely rebuilt: wider, brighter, without blind spots, with a loophole in the middle. On the walls, a long fresco and quotes from the writer Sara Lidman evoking nature.
If Linda Gustafsson’s favorite talks about the beauty of autumn, it is along the banks of the frozen river that another project was born, designed for and by women. “This is the free zone, as it is called!“, she smiles, in front of public benches in the shape of large swings. This installation is the result of workshops carried out in a non-mixed way with young adolescent girls. Because we know that young girls express themselves less and less freely when there are boys. “We tend to build public spaces to encourage physical activity, with football pitches, skate parks… details Linda Gustafsson. But these young girls clearly told us they wanted something else: they wanted a place just to settle down, alone or with friends. There are speakers and, by connecting your phone via Bluetooth, you can listen to music.”
The women’s football team now takes precedence over the men
Women’s concerns have evolved over time. Umeå’s first project in the 1970s was the construction of social housing designed for mothers: with the kitchen windows facing the inner courtyards to keep an eye on the children. In the 90s, access to the football stadium became the symbol of an egalitarian city. The men’s team, out of habit, trains at the best times, between 5 p.m. and 8 p.m. However, the Umeå women’s team is better placed in its league than the men’s team. The town hall will therefore decide – and it is still in force – that it is the best team in the city (regardless of its gender) which will now choose the times at which it wishes to train at the stadium. Many believe that this simple change has allowed this women’s team in yellow and black to become in a few years one of the best clubs in the world, with, among other things, seven league victories and two Women’s Champions Leagues won.
Right in the city center, in a beautiful building that serves as a cultural center – library, restaurants, cinema – is Sweden’s only museum dedicated to the history of women. Opened in 2014, it organizes many meetings and debates and currently offers an exhibition on the extent of the #MeToo movement in Swedish society. A surge that nevertheless took a country reputed to be egalitarian by surprise.
Organized into professional sectors, supported by the unions, the Swedes broke the law of silence, demonstrated massively and urged the management of many companies to strengthen internal procedures in the event of sexual abuse. After a rocky start, the Women’s History Museum is now a consensus in Umeå. Only the two far-right municipal councilors are calling for its closure… or the opening of a “Men’s Museum”.
The report by Carlotta Morteo
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