Social Housing For All: A Vision For Thriving Communities, Renter Power, and Racial Justice

To create a more equitable housing system, we must massively expand social housing: a public option for housing that is permanently affordable, protected from the private market, and publicly owned or under democratic community control.All levels of government must create public, non-profit means of housing finance, construction, management, and ownership to counter real estate speculation—rather than using our public funds to enrich for-profit speculators, private developers, and corporate landlords. Government policy should develop and maintain social housing by employing organized labor and creating union jobs.  And we must ensure that systems of democratic accountability center low-income communities of color, renters, and the most marginalized residents in decision-making and control over resources. The implementation of social housing must redress inequity and exclusion; only through accountability to marginalized communities will social housing programs truly serve their interests

Progress for Who?: Progress Residential Preys on Renters as it Buys Up Homes in Tennessee and the U.S. South

Recent headlines have called attention to the expansion of corporate investors in the single-family rental home industry. Corporate landlords' growing acquisition of homes is particularly high in cities throughout the U.S. South, where a dire lack of renter protections has abetted rapid gentrification. In this context, the National Rental Home Council (NRHC), a real estate industry group headed by the largest single-family rental (SFR) landlords to advance their interests, is holding its national conference in Nashville, Tennessee this April 16-19, 2023. Renters have repeatedly demanded that the NRHC, and the corporate landlords that lead it, adopt tenant protections in the homes they own and manage, due to their exploitative business practices.Tennessee has suffered first-hand the harms that can come from the proliferation of corporate-owned rental homes, and Nashville is a key target for the largest predatory landlords. Renters in corporate-owned properties have reported unfair rent hikes, shoddy maintenance, excessive fees, and more. Renters are organizing against evictions, as well as for limits on arbitrary rent increases, and the right to bargain collectively about living conditions

Methodologies for Housing Justice Resource Guide

This Resource Guide is the outcome of a Summer Institute on Methodologies for Housing Justice convened by the Institute on Inequality and Democracy at UCLA Luskin as part of the Housing Justice in Unequal Cities Network, which is supported by the National Science Foundation (BCS 1758774). Held in Los Angeles in August 2019, the Summer Institute brought together participants from cities around the world. As is the case with the overall scope and purpose of the Housing Justice in Unequal Cities Network, it created a shared terrain of scholarship for movement-based and university-based scholars. Dissatisfied with the canonical methods that are in use in housing studies and guided by housing justice movements that are active research communities, the Summer Institute was premised on the assertion that methodology is political. Methodology is rooted in arguments about the world and involves relations of power and knowledge. The method itself – be it countermapping or people’s diaries – does not ensure an ethics of solidarity and a purpose of justice. Such goals require methodologies for liberation. Thus, as is evident in this Resource Guide, our endeavor foregrounds innovative methods that are being used by researchers across academia and activism and explicitly situates such methods in an orientation towards housing justice

Black, Brown, and Powerful: Freedom Dreams in Unequal Cities

In April 2018, the Institute on Inequality and Democracy convened scholars, activists, policy advocates, community residents, and nonprofit workers to share and discuss research and action pertaining to processes of inequality in Los Angeles. We sought to shed light on the entangled structures of oppression, including urban displacement, housing precarity, racialized policing, criminal justice debt, forced labor, and the mass supervision and control of youth. Through keynote talks, group dialogue, and workshops, we analyzed how in Los Angeles, and elsewhere, black and brown communities face multiple forms of banishment and exploitation ranging from the criminalization of poverty to institutionalized theft.The question of racial banishment has been an important one for the Institute since its inauguration two years ago. This year though, amidst the troubled times of Trumpism, we wanted to shift our focus from banishment to freedom. In the reports that follow, you will find many examples of what Robin D.G. Kelley, a key presence at the Institute, has famously called “freedom dreams.” Located in, and thinking from South Central Los Angeles, the event’s participants provide insight into organizing frameworks and resistance strategies that challenge exclusion and refuse subordination. From tenant organizing to debtors’ unions, from underground scholars to educational reparations, visions of freedom abound. The Institute on Inequality and Democracy is convinced that university-based research can, and must, support such freedom dreams. Such partnership – between the public university and social justice movements – requires careful attention to the difficult task of decolonizing the university. This mandate is evident throughout this collection of reports. There is no easy alliance between academic power and banished communities; there is no obvious solidarity between urban plans and freedom dreams. This event was intended to be a step towards building such alliances, especially by reconstructing the curriculum and canon of knowledge

Investing in the Housing Crisis: An exploration of the North Carolina public pension system's relationship with Landmark Partners and the Single Family Rental industry

North Carolina has a corporate landlord problem. Large investors now own over 40,000 single family homes in North Carolina1, squeezing out would-be homebuyers and burdening renters with rising rental costs and prolonged maintenance issues. Some of these corporate rental companies are owned or backed by private equity firms that receive funding from public pension systems, including the North Carolina Retirement System (NCRS). The North Carolina Retirement System has committed more than $3.2 billion to one such private equity firm, Landmark Partners, since 2014.$2.6 billion of these commitments to Landmark have been made since Dale Folwell became State Treasurer and took over responsibility for the pension fund in 2017. No other pension fund has invested more than $500 million in Landmark during the 2017 - 2022 time period.This matters because Landmark is a major investor in Progress Residential,4 the largest single family rental company in the U.S. with over 7,700 homes in North Carolina

Metodologías para la justicia de la vivienda: Guia de recursos

Esta Guía de Recursos es el resultado de un Instituto de Verano sobre Metodologías para la Justicia en la Vivienda convocado por el Instituto sobre Desigualdad y Democracia de UCLA Luskin como parte de la Red de Justicia en la Vivienda en Ciudades Desiguales, que es apoyada por la Fundación Nacional de Ciencias (BCS 1758774). Celebrado en Los Ángeles en agosto de 2019, el Instituto de Verano reunió a participantes de ciudades de todo el mundo. Al igual que el alcance y el propósito general de la Red de Justicia en las Ciudades Desiguales, creó un terreno compartido de para estudiosos del movimiento y académicos de universidades. Con una insatisfacción a los métodos canónicos que se utilizan en los estudios sobre la vivienda y guiado por los movimientos de justicia de la vivienda que son comunidades de investigación activa, el Instituto de verano se basó en la afirmación de que la metodología es política. La metodología se basa en argumentos sobre el mundo e implica relaciones de poder y conocimiento. El método por sí mismo -ya sea el contra ataque al mapeo o los diarios de la genteno asegura una ética de solidaridad y un propósito de justicia. Tales objetivos requieren metodologías para la liberación. Por lo tanto, como es evidente en esta Guía de Recursos, nuestro esfuerzo pone en primer plano los métodos innovadores que están siendo utilizados por los investigadores en todo el mundo académico y el activismo y sitúa explícitamente tales métodos en una orientación hacia la vivienda la justicia

Truly humanitarian intervention: considering just causes and methods in a feminist cosmopolitan frame

This is the author's accepted manuscript.The original publication is available at http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17449626.2013.849288#.VD7cERYXNWs.In international law, ‘humanitarian intervention’ refers to the use of military force by one nation or group of nations to stop genocide or other gross human rights violations in another sovereign nation. If humanitarian intervention is conceived as military in nature, it makes sense that only the most horrible, massive, and violent violations of human rights can justify intervention. Yet, that leaves many serious evils beyond the scope of legal intervention. In particular, violations of women's rights and freedoms often go unchecked. To address this problem, I begin from two basic questions: When are violations of human rights sufficiently serious to require an international response of some sort? What should that response be? By re-orienting the aim and justification of international law to focus on individual autonomy rather than on peace between nations, I argue that women's rights violations other than genocide and mass rape can warrant intervention. Military intervention is often counter-productive to the aim of achieving autonomy, however. I suggest a range of responses to human rights violations that includes military intervention as one end of the spectrum, and combine this with a greater understanding of the scope of human rights violations that require international response

L.A. Rising: The 1992 Civic Unrest, the Arc of Social Justice Organizing, and the Lessons for Today's Movement Building

Examines the broad, multiracial, multi-sector movement building that has emerged in Los Angeles to demand community benefits agreements; better mass transit systems, school funding and curricula, and job training; and workers' and immigrants' rights

Based on the Cases of Cambodia and the Philippines

학위논문(석사)--서울대학교 대학원 :국제대학원 국제학과(국제지역학전공),2019. 8. Sheen, Seong-Ho.개발원조는 외교 정책을 수행하는 데 있어 중요한 도구 중 하나이므로 이는 공여국과 수원국의 국가이익, 외교전략 및 국가비전을 뚜렷하게 드러낸다. 동남아시아에서 미국과 중국의 원조 경쟁이 점점 치열해지고 있는 가운데, 점차 떠오르는 중국의 저우추취(走出去)전략에 있어, 미국은 공여국의 지배적인 위치를 점하지 못하고 있다. 동남아는 미국의 아시아 태평양 지역전략의 중추적인 위치에 놓여있고, 중국의 인접지역 이므로, 미 - 중의 경제와 안보에 밀접히 연관된 지역이다. 동남아시아의 지정학적 특성상 미 - 중 양국이 자신의 국가이익을 수호하고자 개발원조의 수단으로 지역 세력균형을 유지하기 위해 양국의 경쟁이 이 지역에서 펼쳐지고 있다. 본 논문은 캄보디아와 필리핀 두 지역을 사례로 아래의 두 연구 목적을 달성하고자 한다: 1) 21 세기에 중국과 미국이 캄보디아와 필리핀에 제공 한 개발원조에 초점을 맞추어, 성격이 다른 두 개의 개발원조 및 수원국의 반응의 유사점과 차이점을 비교하고자 한다. 2) 개발원조의 관점에서 캄보디아와 필리핀이 미국과 중국 사이에서 망설이는 이유를 설명하고자 한다. 물론, 캄보디아는 중국과 냉전이후부터 이어진 전통적 우호관계에 있는 국가이고, 필리핀은 미국의 동맹국으로서 아세안국가에서 가장 많은 군사적원조를 받고, 미국의 의제에 굳건히 따르는 나라이므로, 두 나라는 아세안 국가에서 서로 정반대의 입장을 취하고 있는 나라라고 할 수 있다. 그럼에도 불구하고, 21세기 초부터, 특히 중국이 일대일로 사업을 추진하고 난 후, 양국은 미국을 점차 멀리하고 중국의 개발원조에 관심을 갖기 시작했고, 이는 양국의 외교정책이 변화하고 있음을 시사한다. 개발원조를 기점으로, 동남아시아 지역의 세력균형이 변화되고 있는 모습을 발견할 수 있다. 본 논문은 공여국과 수원국의 시각에서 이 현상에 대해 설명하고자 하며, 이는 국가이익의 변동, 미 – 중이 제공하는 개발원조의 차이, 그리고 캄보디아와 필리핀의 국가 지도자 자체가 두 강대국에 대한 태도의 변화로 이어졌다고 주장하는 바이다.Foreign aid has always been one of the most important tools in implementing foreign policy, and offers a distinct perspective to observe ones national interests, foreign strategy and objective, either for the donors or the receivers. With Chinas rising and its implementation of going out policy, U.S. can no longer keep its position as the dominant donor around the world. Especially when we come to the area of Southeast Asia, one of the most important strategic region for U.S. as a pillar in Asia-Pacific and for China as key neighborhood both in economic and security, the competition of foreign aid has become much more intense in order to achieve ones own national interests as well as trip each other in balancing of power. This article selects Cambodia and the Philippines as two targeting cases, trying to achieve two purposes, 1) focus on the foreign aid provided by China and the United States to Cambodia and the Philippines in the 21st century, trying to compare the similarities and differences between the two-different kind of foreign aid and the responses of recipient countries; 2) explain Cambodia and Philippines swing between U.S. and China through the perspective of foreign aid. Cambodia has been a traditional ally of China since the Cold War, while the Philippines act as the traditional security ally of the United States who receive the most U.S. military assistance in ASEAN and always been firmly following the U.S. in the international agenda. Through the whole research, although Cambodia and the Philippines can be two different types of country representing ASEAN in playing between U.S. and China, as they always show opposite stands towards China and U.S. in ASEAN, however, since the beginning of the 21st century, especially since China proposed the Belt and Road Initiative policy, both the two countries show a tendency to drift apart from the United States but approach China in terms of foreign aid, which can be seen as a symptom for their changes of foreign policy. Taking foreign aid as an entry point, we can see the direction of power balancing changes in the southeast Asia region. This article tries to explain this interesting phenomenon through both of the perspective of the donors and the recipients. I argue that it is the national interest changes, the different features between the foreign aid offered by China and U.S., as well as the national leader themselves led to their different attitudes towards two great powers.Chapter I Introduction 2 1. Background of the study 2 2. Literature review 5 3. Methodology 9 Chapter II The Foreign Aid from U.S. and China 12 1. Definition of foreign aid 12 2. Comparison between U.S. and China offering foreign aid 16 3. The history of foreign aid in ASEAN from U.S. 21 4. The history of foreign aid in ASEAN from China 26 Chapter III Foreign Aid to Cambodia since 21th Century 29 1. Change of foreign aid from U.S. and China 29 2. Comparison of foreign aid between U.S. and China 31 3. Cambodias changing attitudes between U.S. and China 40 Chapter IV Foreign Aid to the Philippines since 21th Century 45 1. Change of foreign aid from U.S. and China 45 2. Comparison of foreign aid between U.S. and China 47 3. The Philippines changing attitudes between U.S. and China 53 Chapter V Conclusion 58 Bibliography 61Maste