The Personal Networks of Women in Canberra

Abstract

In 2013, I carried out a sample survey of women in Canberra regarding their personal networks to assess social ties from the viewpoint of “the community question” [Wellman 1979]. My analyses revealed the following three outcomes: (1) Canberra’s urban planners invoked influential concepts like the garden city movement, the neighbourhood unit, and the Radburn system, all of which guided construction of new towns in the twentieth century. My data indicate that these urban-planning strategies did not affect the personal networks of Canberra women because most could move freely within the city using their own car. (2) Women’s personal networks consisted mainly of friendship and kinship relationships. The primacy of neighbourhood relationships declined alongside an increase in social relationships that extended beyond neighbourhood ties and which connected dispersed locations across Canberra, including a neighbouring small city, Queanbeyan. Women who lived in remote places were more likely to be connected to friends and relatives than women who lived in the city. Additionally, friends were such a powerful source of social support that they almost matched relatives. Overall, the “community liberated” perspective was more consistent with the data than were either the “lost” or the “saved” perspectives. (3) Nobe [1991] conducted a similar survey in Canberra in 1986-87. However, because more women spent their teenage years in Canberra in 2013 than in 1986-87, they found more kinship relationships in their participants’ networks than I did. The women I interviewed in 2013 had, on average, resided in the city for longer than Nobe’s 1986-87 study participants, which may explain why they had more friendship relationships in their networks. Furthermore, the high academic attainment of Canberra women drove the formation of friendship relationships within the city.