Living with urban floods in Metro Manila: a gender approach to mobilities, work and climatic events

Abstract

With this paper, I demonstrate the importance of a gendered approach to work-related mobilities, in understanding the linkages between mobilities and urban flooding. Drawing on a qualitative study conducted in the Malate district in Metro Manila, I focus on work-related mobilities of low-income communities, particularly on the impact of floods on urban mobilities. Rather than considering floods as disasters, I conceptualise floods as part of everyday urban life, and demonstrate how climatic conditions traverse the dynamics of home-work linkages, localities and employment in the Urban South. I argue that bridging mobility and climatic conditions from a gender perspective brings forth how the conflicting narratives of confinement and independence are implicated in the everyday lives of the women living in low-income settlements. This eventually challenges current policy representations on the societal impacts of adverse weather and economic conditions on vulnerable communities.