Housing policies and the post-socialist city: actors, strategies, outcomes

Session proposal for the 5th International Urban Geographies Conference of Post-Socialist Cities

Urban Research, Urban Theory and Planning Practice in Tbilisi, 11 th-13th September 2013

Housing policies and the post-socialist city: actors, strategies, outcomes

Research on post-socialist cities is often focused on residential change, stressing topics like suburbanization, gentrification, residential segregation and residential satisfaction. Moreover one can find a decent number of studies that tackle issues of new types of housing and socio-spatial changes in neighborhoods in general. Rather minor intention is paid to the politico-institutional settings that shape these issues as well. Especially the role of national or municipal housing policies, strategies of urban authorities or the effects of public-private partnerships on housing do not get so much attention. Therefore the aim of this session is to bring together papers that focus on the role of East European and Post-Soviet states and municipalities in terms of housing policy making and the influence of transnational policy networks.

Furthermore this session invites contributions that tackle the broad theme of social justice and housing. In particular we’d like to focus on the perception and strategic position of East European and Post-Soviet municipalities regarding the availability and affordability of housing for particular social groups and various forms of displacement processes.

Therefore papers on various topics are welcomed, and not limited to:

• What is the role of housing policies for changes in post-socialist cities?
• How are post-socialist housing policies constructed?
• What are the major discourses that shape housing policies in the post-socialist city?
• What are key challenges to post-socialist housing policies?
• Policy transfer or policy mobility: the importance of global, regional and local actors in housing
• Path-dependencies and path-shaping in housing policy (trans)formations
• Processes and consequences of privatization
• Housing policies beyond privatization: public housing management and construction, housing support schemes, transformation of housing estates etc.

Please send your abstracts to the session organizers by February 10th 2013.

Christian Smigiel, University of Leipzig (christiansmigiel@hotmail.com)
Roman Matoušek, Charles University in Prague (roman.matousek@natur.cuni.cz)