Critical Planning

Through the lens of female formal employment, this paper aims to highlight the complex lives of female garment factory workers in urban Bangladesh and subsequently challenge the theoretical foundations of current policies that seek to empower them. Based on the assumption that employment guarantees empowerment, we identify the significant power imbalance that exists between men and women at all levels of Bangladeshi society. In doing so, this paper provides a more complex understanding of how socio-cultural struc- tures significantly impact women’s experience of space, and ultimately provides practical and theoretical recommendations to help inform effective policy development.