The caring city: Ethics of urban design By JulietDavis, Bristol: Bristol University Press. 2022. 238 pp. $158.25 (hardback). ISBN: 9781529201215

OpenAlex English

The caring city: Ethics of urban design addresses the context of the growing need for care in cities around the world, through the fields of urban design and care work. Although Juliet Davis notes the contested nature of the concept of care, she defines it broadly as an ethics, that is “how the concrete and particular needs of human and/or nonhuman others are recognized and addressed” (p. 7). Davis points to the emergence of a care crisis as a result of a number of factors, including the increased employment of women, aging societies, the diminishing role of the state in welfare provision, economic issues and social inequalities, and people's deteriorating health. The cumulative effect of these factors is an increased need for care, which is difficult to meet with current existing resources. All eight chapters help to clarify the concept of the caring city through theoretical definitions and a case study approach. The first two chapters serve as a theoretical introduction to the issue of care in relation to urban design. From the third chapter to the end of the eighth, Davis analyzes two cases in depth in relation to the theme of each chapter. These cases range from an almshouse to cohousing; from streetscape to kampung—a community settlement; from design as an invitation to children in urban areas with better air quality to the design of an urban park in a preindustrial area; from site-and-service development to social housing; from housing estates under development pressure to water infrastructure or housing that respects natural resources. For Davis, care—which is made up of needs, practices, and relationships—is firstly about responding to needs. It is relational in the sense of interdependence between the care giver and the care receiver; it is a dynamic and temporal process that changes over people's life stages, including stages of care; and it is not only about the present but also about the future. She bases her argument on the idea that a good city in the 21st century is a caring city, which addresses the ethics of care and the “materialities of care” (p. 24). The materialities of care refer to tools, instruments, and settings that are visible in “urban forms, infrastructures and urban transformation processes” (p. 8). Care, therefore, concerns both the spatial and social aspects of the city, and not only vulnerable groups, but everyone. For this reason, Davis argues it should be provided more collectively by citizens, communities, and welfare states, rather than being seen as simply the responsibility of women, in which case care becomes unjust. Other examples of unjust care practices are given as “the devaluing of care, the exclusion of vulnerable people from areas of development pressure and environmental exploitation” (p. 196). Because Davis does not limit care to people's immediate health needs, her last two chapters offer an interesting combination of topics including urban studies, ecology, and care. Care includes people's attachment to place, their homes, and their sense of continuity within them. Thus, to argue for a caring city would be to support people's right to housing and to stay in their homes despite the tides of urban renewal. It is also about taking responsibility for future generations by caring for limited environmental resources such as water, soil, and air. Additionally, it is about place as the infrastructure of care, such as housing; appropriate urban atmospheres, both aerographic and affective; accessibility of services and infrastructure; and openness, as in flexibility of design. Davis addresses each of these characteristics of care in relation to urban design in separate chapters including detailed case studies—from Bengaluru, Indore, London, Singapore, South Wales, Valencia, and Vienna—where the objects of care could be as diverse as children, the elderly, and residents of housing estates, or water resources as nonhuman recipients of care. For Davis, these cases allow for “nuanced, bottom-up understandings of ‘good care'” (p. 191), and thus of a good city. Davis concludes her book by describing and summarizing urban design approaches that have an ethics of care. She clarifies her position—a middle ground to “create difference within the context of shared structure” (p. 192)—against the dichotomy of universalism/particularism, arguing that one need not abandon universals for the sake of people's particular care needs. She contrasts development based on caring design with development that is “capital centric, speculation and investment driven or subordinated to urban growth agendas” (p. 196). In the afterword, she also reflects on the additional care needs and practices that emerged during the pandemic and how she, as a mother and academic, coped with these changes. Overall, Davis makes a good contribution to the search for a viable urban alternative, complementing other similar efforts by feminist scholars in the search for cities that are planned, designed, and managed in a more equal and collective way, including the issue of care provision (Kern, 2021; Morrow & Parker, 2020). Apart from a few typographical errors in the conclusion, and the untapped potential of summarizing some of the main ideas in Chapters 1 and 2 in tables and diagrams, the book is a valuable read for all social and architectural scholars concerned with the present and future of care.