Competing Ideas of Social Justice and Space: Locating Critiques of Housing Renewal in Theory and in Practice

Abstract

This article considers the experience of the English government's policy of HousingMarket Renewal from the perspective of spatial justice. The paper first proposes an analytical framework that situates competing notions of territorial social justice within a space of complex sociospatial relations. The dialectic of two formulations of social justice is first set up, comparing 'procedural' or deontological forms of justice and the distributional justice of outcomes. Soja's formulation of spatial justice is advanced as an appropriate balance between spatial and socio-historic contexts for the justice question. Drawing on the literature on sociospatial relations, concrete critiques and justifications of HMR are then positioned in terms of the intersection of structuring principles and policy fields. The role of demolition in urban restructuring programmes is used to explore the differential spatialities involved in different justicial perspectives. It is concluded that 'gentrification' critiques of HMR are only partial in their evaluation of justice and lack normative power. Some practical implications for the design of urban restructuring policies are offered.

Indicators for Measuring Spatial Justice and Land Tenure Security for Poor and Low Income Urban Dwellers

“…Within that framework, three dimensions are identified: rules, processes, and outcomes [8,9,14,19,48,66]. An evaluation of spatial justice and land tenure security can therefore be carried out at each of those three dimensions using the relevant indicators as per Figure 1.…”

“…Those include the United Nations and Un-Habitat, who are interested in monitoring the progress towards the development of inclusive cities and the promotion of land tenure security from a right to the city lens [24,60]. As the security of tenure is of paramount importance for the access to or use of other urban resources [14,31], the contribution of this paper is to develop indicators that address access, ownership, and use of land and related assets, including the basic urban amenities. Prior to the development of those indicators, it is worth distilling different forms of spatial justice from contemporary approaches to and options for urban (re)development as it is relevant to link them to those indicators.…”

Expropriation of Real Property in Kigali City: Scoping the Patterns of Spatial Justice

“…Deontologism emphasises the role of good rules and processes in advancing justice alongside the management of societal resources and their allocation among different users. Consequentialism claims for equity in the outcomes those rules and processes lead to [26]. In those ethoses, the applied framework comprises of a series of indicators connected to three dimensions of spatial justice, namely rules, processes and outcomes and its three forms consisting of procedural, recognitional and redistributive [17].…”

The Social Value of Housing in Straitened Times: The View from England

“…Middle-class aesthetes were incensed by the apparent sacrifice of Britain's built heritage to the modernising bulldozer. Many saw the programme as a travesty of social justice, although Ferrari (2012b) and Pinnegar (2012) note that alternative definitions of social justice, emphasising territorial justice, would require a different interpretation. They argue that programmes like HMR are essentially designed to deliver better housing and economic opportunities 'for the city' (Pinnegar, 2012) and thus need to be judged on whether such an approach leads to benefits for all residents over the longer term.…”