The Social Tenant, the Law and the UK's Politics of Austerity

<p>This paper considers current cuts to social housing provision in the UK made in the name of austerity. It focuses particularly on the &lsquo;bedroom tax&rsquo; &mdash;the cut to housing benefit for working-age social housing tenants whose property is deemed to provide more bedrooms than they need. It begins by explaining the long-standing political project of social housing in the UK. This background is important to explain the emergence of a discursively ghettoized population within social housing. We then turn to the &lsquo;bedroom tax&rsquo; itself. We consider the two quite separate rationales underpinning its introduction. One rationale &mdash;fairness&mdash; is the focus of the politicians; the other &mdash;under-occupation&mdash; provides the focus for policy analysts. Both offer different versions of truth about the social in social housing and both are unconvincing. For us, this is significant because the politics of austerity require the support of public opinion. We then consider some strategies of resistance to the &lsquo;bedroom tax&rsquo; which harness the disruptive potential of fairness before concluding that the bedroom tax requires relatively little unpacking to reveal it as an ideological device which operates to increase inequality whilst deploying a rhetoric of fairness.</p> <hr /><p>Este art&iacute;culo analiza los recortes en las prestaciones de viviendas sociales que se realizan actualmente en el Reino Unido en nombre de la austeridad. Se centra particularmente en el 'impuesto dormitorio' -el recorte en el subsidio de vivienda para inquilinos en edad de trabajar, cuya vivienda se considera que tiene m&aacute;s dormitorios de los que necesitan. Comienza explicando el proyecto pol&iacute;tico de viviendas sociales, de larga tradici&oacute;n en el Reino Unido. Estos antecedentes son importantes para explicar el surgimiento de guetos en las viviendas sociales. A continuaci&oacute;n se centra en el "impuesto dormitorio&rdquo; en s&iacute; mismo. Se analizan los dos diferentes motivos que sustentan su promulgaci&oacute;n. Una es la raz&oacute;n esgrimida por los pol&iacute;ticos -legitimidad-, la otra &ndash;baja ocupaci&oacute;n-, la esgrimen los analistas pol&iacute;ticos. Ambos ofrecen diferentes versiones de la verdad acerca de lo social en materia de vivienda social y ambos son poco convincentes. En nuestra opini&oacute;n, esto es relevante porque las pol&iacute;ticas de austeridad requieren del apoyo de la opini&oacute;n p&uacute;blica. Despu&eacute;s consideramos algunas estrategias de resistencia al "impuesto dormitorio" que aprovechan el potencial disruptivo de equidad, antes de concluir que es relativamente sencillo revelarlo como un instrumento ideol&oacute;gico que opera para aumentar la desigualdad, a la vez que utiliza una ret&oacute;rica de equidad.</p> <p><strong>DOWNLOAD THIS PAPER FROM SSRN</strong>: <a href="http://ssrn.com/abstract=2565733" target="_blank">http://ssrn.com/abstract=2565733 </a></p

Governing and Governance: A Social Housing Case Study

This research project concerns the role of members of governing boards of formerly public assets, where these assets are transferred to a private or quasi-public organisation. Members of these governing boards, although drawn from particular constituencies, are meant to be neutral and experts. We use a case study approach and a qualitative methodology. The case study concerns the governing board of a housing association, which was set up to take on the management of properties formerly managed by a local authority (referred to as a 'large-scale voluntary transfer'). The research notes tensions in the notion of neutrality and explores what counts as 'expertise'.governance; neutral; expertise; housing; representatives; transfer

Regulating home:A case study

In this article, we draw on recent scholarship on home, property and regulation to develop an idea of home as being co-constituted by, and through, three different types of regulation – regulation of the self, regulation of life, and regulation as enforcement. We demonstrate how a focus on the mundane in regulation, as opposed to the spectacular, impacts on the making and unmaking of home in this context. Rather than draw on traditional housing tenures to make our point, we de-dramatize the relationship between home and tenure (ownership or renting) by drawing on a case study of a particular type of owned but precarious housing – those living in boats on a canal in England

A perennial problem? On underoccupation in English council housing

Addressing the issue of underoccupation has been a prominent feature in English social housing policy since the Conservative-Liberal Democrat Coalition government was formed in 2010. A key move under the Coalition’s welfare reform agenda was the implementation of the underoccupancy penalty—the so-called ‘bedroom tax’—from April 2013. However, while this policy triggered high-profile protests, it does not represent a novel policy preoccupation. Variations on the theme have recurred in housing policy debates almost since the advent of council housing. This paper adopts a long-term perspective and presents a sociological institutionalist analysis which focuses on the mechanisms through which underoccupation has been governed. Drawing on a range of archival material, we argue that the government of underoccupation has undergone revealing transformations over the period since 1929. Not only does the broader policy context—understandings of the purpose of social housing and the role it fulfils in the housing market—differ over time, but, at the more detailed level of policy instruments, the mechanisms proposed to address underoccupation differ in ways that can be explained in terms of prevailing policy logics and institutional structures. Most significantly, the nature of the underoccupation problem has been framed differently: the rationales offered as justification for policy action draw on very different vocabularies, in ways that allow us to trace the influence of more fundamental shifts in policy discourse into the domain of housing policy

Charitable purposes and the shaping effects of money

We address a curious omission from both the literature on the law of charity and socio-legal studies – the effect of apparently extraneous factors, such as politics and ideology, as well as the searching for money on the charitable purposes and identities of the public who are to benefit from the charity. This is a curious omission because even the law accepts that the idea of public benefit in charity law is a sociological concept, albeit one that has developed a technical meaning. We argue that approaching charitable purposes and public benefit as sociological concepts enables us to appreciate the tensions that those external factors produce as they re-shape those purposes and refashion the public who are to benefit. We refer to these factors under the rubric of the shaping effects of money. We use a case-study of the Canal and River Trust (CRT) to develop this argument. The trust was set up by the government as a charity to manage and control 2,000 miles of inland waterways in England and Wales. We draw on interviews with households who live on boats and ‘continuously cruise’ those boats on the canals to illustrate how their interests have been marginalised as the CRT has re-shaped itself as a well-being charity

Chapter 7 ‘Indefensible and Irresponsible'

Drawing on a range of approaches from the social sciences and humanities, this handbook explores theoretical and empirical perspectives that address the articulation of law in society, and the social character of the rule of law. The vast field of socio-legal studies provides multiple lenses through which law can be considered. Rather than seeking to define the field of socio-legal studies, this book takes up the experiences of researchers within the field. First-hand accounts of socio-legal research projects allow the reader to engage with diverse theoretical and methodological approaches within this fluid interdisciplinary area. The book provides a rich resource for those interested in deepening their understanding of the variety of theories and methods available when law is studied in its broadest social context, as well as setting those within the history of the socio-legal movement. The chapters consider multiple disciplinary lenses – including feminism, anthropology and sociology – as well as a variety of methodologies, including: narrative, visual and spatial, psychological, economic and epidemiological approaches. Moreover, these are applied in a range of substantive contexts such as online hate speech, environmental law, biotechnology, research in post-conflict situations, race and LGBT+ lawyers. The handbook brings together younger contributors and some of the best-known names in the socio-legal field. It offers a fresh perspective on the past, present and future of sociolegal studies that will appeal to students and scholars with relevant interests in a range of subjects, including law, sociology and politics

A Novel Method for Detecting Wild Boar Presence

Populations of wild boar and feral pigs (Sus scrofa) are increasing in numbers and distribution worldwide, in parallel with their significant environmental and economic impact. Reliable methods to detect the presence of this species are needed for monitoring its natural range expansion and its occurrence in areas where animals have been deliberately or accidentally introduced. The main aim of this study, carried out in English woodlands recently colonized by wild boar, was to assess the effectiveness of a birch wood tar-based compound, to detect the presence of this species in presence/absence surveys. A pilot trial in woodlands where wild boar had been established for circa 20 years found that wild boar sniffed and rubbed their bodies against stakes treated with this compound significantly more than against control stakes treated with water, thus confirming that the birch wood tar attracted wild boar to stakes. A second trial, carried out by applying the birch wood tar to trees in 8 woodlands surrounding the core range of wild boar, found that these animals left consistently more activity signs such as rubbing, tusk marks, and rooting on or around trees treated with this compound than on or around control trees treated with water. These results suggest that birch wood tar can be used as a method to confirm presence of wild boar in an area. Possible applications of this compound include its use to increase trapping efficiency or its deployment to confirm the success of a local eradication

Novel Management Methods: Immunocontraception and Other Fertility Control Tools

Impacts of overabundant ungulate populations on human activities and conservation include crop and forestry losses, collisions with vehicles, disease transmission, nuisance behaviour, damage to infrastructures, predation on livestock and native species, and reduction of biodiversity in plant and animal communities (e.g. Curtis et ai., 2002; Massei et al., 2011; Reimoser and Putman, 2011; Ferroglio et ai., 2011; Langbein et al., 2011). Current trends in human population growth and landscape development indicate that human-ungulate conflicts in Europe, as well as in the United States, are likely to increase in parallel with increased expansion in numbers and range of many of these species (Rutberg and Naugle, 2008; Brainerd and Kaltenborn, 2010; Gionfriddo et aI., 2011 a). Many of these conflicts have been traditionally managed by lethal methods. However, current trends in distribution and numbers of wild boar, feral pigs and deer in Europe and in the United States (e.g. Saez-Royuela and Telleria, 1986; Waithman et ai., 1999; Ward, 2005; Apollonio et al., 2010) suggest that recreational hlllting is not sufficient to control ungulate densities. In addition, ethical considerations regarding humane treatment of animals are increasingly shaping public attitudes about what are considered acceptable methods of mitigating human-wildlife conflicts, and lethal control is often opposed (Beringer et al., 2002; Wilson, 2003; Barfield et al., 2006; McShea, 2012). Public antipathy towards lethal methods increasingly constrains the options available for ungulate management, particularly in urban and suburban areas and in protected areas where culling is often opposed on ethical, legal or safety grounds (Kirkpatrick et al., 2011; Boulanger et al., 2012; Rutberg et al., 2013). Consequently, interest in non-lethal methods, such as translocation or fertility control, has increased (Fagerstone et ai., 2010)