CALL FOR PAPERS

London’s alternative housing: collaboration, sharing and participation
Royal Geographical Society with IBG Annual Conference, London, 27-29 August 2014.
Melissa Fernandez, LSE London, (Geography Dpt.) LSE & Kath Scanlon, LSE London, (Geography Dpt.) LSE.
London’s housing – of all tenures- is a sphere of growing inequality and unaffordability. Housing in the capital city is the most expensive in the country, there are more households than dwellings, an increasing number of potential households cannot form because of the extent of housing pressure and there is far more overcrowding than elsewhere (Whitehead and Travers 2012). The increased cost of home ownership and private renting has put them out of reach for many, while social housing and other accommodation options for the most vulnerable (like squatting) are either largely inaccessible or penalized. But this bleak context, and the larger political and economic crises framing it, also provides the setting for alternative logics and housing practices that are challenging traditional notions of private property.
Experiments and utopian alternatives, like co-housing, or mutual home-ownership blur the boundaries between ‘the personal’ and ‘the shared’, as normally understood in the traditional (Western) individualised notion of home and dwelling.  Their advocates are working actively towards more community-driven housing forms, using participative methods to foster engagement.  At the same time, austerity measures have led some official housing policy (like, Community Right to Build) to incorporate the language of ‘sharing’, self-build or co-management in their own discourse. How do we reconcile these apparently diverging, yet coinciding trends? What insights do these emerging practices offer neo-liberal critiques of unequal property relations and urban regeneration? How do other alternatives, like squatting, fit into this picture?

This panel seeks contributions (not limited to papers alone) from scholars, researchers and practitioners focusing on the policies and practices of alternative housing in London today. It is interested not only in the way these forms are emerging and taking place, but also in how (and why) these may be manifesting differently across distinct London geographies.  Some suggested (but not exhaustive) topics that may be addressed are:

•      alternative and participative forms of  land ownership, housing design and (eco/sustainable) construction/refurbishment as well as community building, site management, living arrangements, renting and re-sale conditions;

•      co-housing, and work-live spaces;

•      squatting and ‘beds in sheds’;

•      diverse perspectives and experiences: from residents, developers, architects, and housing associations to local authority personnel, community organizations, third-sector or policy-makers;

•      the personal/private/individual and shared/public/communal;

•      solidarity;

•      conflict and dissent;

•      methodological challenges in researching this area.

We are looking for abstracts/contribution summaries of 300 words to be sent to both session conveners by Monday 3rd February 2014 ([log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>; [log in to unmask]<mailto:[log in to unmask]>) .

Please access the attached hyperlink for an important electronic communications disclaimer: http://lse.ac.uk/emailDisclaimer

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