1st Edition
Beyond Home Ownership Housing, Welfare and Society
In context of ongoing transformations in housing markets and socioeconomic conditions, this book focuses on past, current and future roles of home ownership in social policies and welfare practices. It considers owner-occupied housing in terms of diverse meanings and manifestations, but in particular the part played by housing tenure in the political, socioeconomic and demographic changes that have characterized the pre- and post-crisis era.
The intensified promotion of home ownership in recent decades helped stimulate an increasing orientation towards the private consumption of housing, not only as a home, but also an asset – or possibly speculative vehicle – that enhances household economic capacity and can be transferred to children or other family, or even exchanged for other goods. The latest global financial crisis, however, made it clear that owner-occupied housing markets and mortgage sectors have become deeply embedded in networks of socioeconomic interdependency and risk.
This collection engages with numerous debates on housing and society in a range of developed societies from North America to Asia-Pacific to North, South, East and West Europe. Interdisciplinary contributors draw upon diverse empirical data to explore how housing and home ownership has become so embedded in polity, economy and household welfare conditions in various social and cultural contexts. Another concern is what lies beyond home ownership considering the integration of housing systems with economic growth and social stability appears to be unravelling. This volume speaks to public debates concerning the future of housing markets, policy and tenure, providing deep and provocative insights for academics, students and professionals alike.
Preface Introduction 1. Beyond Home Ownership Richard Ronald and Marja Elsinga Part 1. Demographic Change, Housing Wealth and Welfare 2. Housing and Demographic Change John Doling 3.The Housing Pillar of the Mediterranean Welfare Regime: Family, State and Market in the Social Production of Home Ownership in Italy Teresio Poggio 4. Home Ownership in Post-Socialist Countries: Between Macro Economy and Micro Structures of Welfare Provision Srna Mandic Part 2. Government, Markets and Policies 5. Home Ownership and Nordic Housing Policies in ‘Retrenchment’ Hannu Ruonavaara 6. Owner-Occupation in an Increasingly Uncertain World: The English Experience Christine M. E. Whitehead 7. Home Ownership as Public Policy in the USA Rachel G. Bratt 8. Home Ownership Risk and Responsibility Before and After the U.S. Mortgage Crisis Rachel G. Bratt Part 3. Housing Ladders and Fading Dreams 9. The Shifting Housing Opportunities of Younger People in Japan’s Home-Owning Society Yosuke Hirayama 10. Home Ownership - Continuing or Fading Dream? David Thorns
Biography
Richard Ronald is an Assistant Professor in Urban Studies at the University of Amsterdam and a Visiting Scholar in the Department of Housing and Interior Design at Kyung Hee University, Seoul. He is review editor of the International Journal of Housing Policy and section editor of the International Encyclopedia of Housing and Home. He has published widely on housing, urban and social change in Europe and Asia-Pacific and in particular on international market and policy transformations concerning home ownership.
Marja Elsinga is a Professor in the Faculty of Technology, Policy and Management at the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands. She is associate editor-in-chief of the International Encyclopedia of Housing and Home and editor-in-chief of the Dutch Journal for Housing. She has published widely on home ownership and risk, housing affordability, social housing and housing governance.
The articles in this compilation…overlap rather remarkably in their shared discussions of the welfare
state, the advance of neoliberal housing regimes, and the contextualization of current housing crises
into larger structural patterns. The authors clearly reflect on common questions in the process of
writing individual pieces, and the resulting articles are richer for it. This book is recommended for
academics and practitioners as well as educated lay audiences.- Journal of Urban Affairs, Vol. 37/No. 1/2015
