Stuck in the suburbs? Gendered perspectives on living at the edge of the post-communist city

One of the most notable processes of urban spatial restructuring in Eastern Europe since the end of communism has been that of suburbanization. The literature on suburbanization in Western contexts has firmly shown its gender-laden nature. Yet there have been few studies of the gender impacts of post-communist suburbanization. In this paper, I aim to partially fill this gap in the literature by exploring men’s and women’s views on living in the post-communist suburbs of the Bulgarian capital of Sofia. Using a survey of 250 suburban residents and two dozen in-depth interviews, I show that men and women have different suburban experiences. Women find it harder to get to central Sofia than do men. And although female employment rates remain high, suburban women report becoming more dependent on their male partners and having greater difficulty in balancing commutes, paid work and household responsibilities.