Women and Toilets: "Flush with Inequality"

After sharing CNN's article on 7 stories of African women and their personal experiences with toilets, in order to bring awareness of World Toilet day, it got me thinking more about gender perspectives of sanitation provision.

Penner (2010) discusses how toilets are a powerful symbol of inclusion and are an arena whereby distinctions in class, race, gender and religion are highlighted and contested, within built environments. Women face vulnerabilities when using public toilets as the holes at the bottom show their feet, making them more prone to attack or rape, and those who openly defecate experience a loss of dignity. 

It is clear that there have been efforts to improve public toilet access in developing areas. An example of this is the eThekwini Water and Sanitation service in Durban, South Africa, that install Urine Diversion (UD) toilets, which are dry and self-contained sanitation systems and divert urine in a separate compartment from faeces so it dries quicker. This has been an alternative solution to sewage systems that support flush toilets, as many households cannot afford to pay the associated water rates. The UD programme is low maintenance, can use nutrients from urine for fertilisers, and manages to keep faeces out of the water supply, reducing water-borne diseases (Gouden et al, 2006). However many aren't satisfied with this method of toilet use, as they object to handling their own waste and requires more effort than the "Flush and go" systems (Penner, 2014:136). The responsibility of disposing this waste and maintenance of these toilets generally tend to fall on the women in the households, in which many find it physically challenging. Furthermore, from a user point of view, many women feel that the toilet design isn't gender appropriate, as they haven't taken into consideration that men and women excrete in different ways. 

Source: http://www.susana.org/_resources/documents/default/2-911-en-poster-ud-south-africa-2005.pdf

Even though, it is undeniable the UD toilets are a step up from buckets or pit latrines, there is still a much stronger preference for flush toilets in many of these regions, as they represent a form a modernity and better quality of living. However we once again must factor women's roles as, flush systems without in-house taps will increase their workload, as they have to fetch water needed for flushing (Van de Voorden et al, 2002:4). Additionally, within South Africa, it is clear that the predominantly rich white neighbourhoods are able to gain access to flush toilets and are not expected to use UD toilets, unlike many black impoverished communities, thus highlighting how the distribution of sanitation access can also be further exacerbated by race and class.

Overall, we need to be gender and class sensitive in regards to the various elements that make provision of toilets logistically adequate enough, equitable enough and dignified enough. Lastly in order to achieve social justice, it is important to ask questions such as, what are the opportunity costs for adopting one service provision over another? Who decides what service is appropriate enough? How can we address the structural inequalities of toilet access, providing a range of options, regardless of social standing within society?