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

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

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