Place, inhabitance and citizenship: the right to housing and the right to the city in the contemporary urban world

Commodifying danish housing commons

“…We should be cautious about drawing general conclusions from specific historicalgeographical experiences, of course. But if we strive for commons of available and affordable housing, not to mention the additional dimensions that can be attached to 'the right to housing' (Rolnik 2014), the Danish case suggests that private associations can be an measure to counter neoliberalising urban politics. But, as demonstrated by the fate of the private cooperatives, it is essential that membership of such associations does not involve opportunities for private gains.…”

Understanding formal and informal relationships in settlement upgrading for planning just and inclusive cities: the case of Phnom Penh, Cambodia

“…This happens even when collective relationships to land, housing and place, and various forms of collective action exist in cities, giving more importance to the use value of the city rather than its exchange value (Mathivet, 2014;Rolnik, 2014;Boonyabancha & Kerr, 2015;Cabannes, 2017). These collective relationships to place and forms of collective action explain how agency, social capital, and citizenship can emerge out of ordinary life and the lack of control from governments, and in the case of informal settlements, out of the struggle that many people experience to make a decent life and claim rights to the city (Bayat, 2000;Holston, 2009).…”

“…These collective relationships to place and forms of collective action explain how agency, social capital, and citizenship can emerge out of ordinary life and the lack of control from governments, and in the case of informal settlements, out of the struggle that many people experience to make a decent life and claim rights to the city (Bayat, 2000;Holston, 2009). Also, for informal settlers, collective action arises as the key mechanism to build power and expand this power to resist and negotiate the various forms of exclusion, marginalization and dispossession they face for being considered 'informal' (Castells, 1983;Boonyabancha, 2001;Archer, 2012;Beard, 2012;Rolnik, 2014;Levy, 2015;Boonyabancha & Kerr, 2015;Roitman, 2019). Thus, binaries and dichotomies reproduce power relationships used to, on the one hand, marginalize and exclude the informal to make room for what is considered legitimate in cities; and on the other hand, impose an individual and market-oriented model of urban development that commodifies land and housing, and continues to create inequalities and dispossession in cities (Porter, 2011;Mathivet, 2014;Rolnik, 2015).…”

“…Therefore, the commodification of space is possible, in a way in which land and housing in cities become property and a profitable asset with direct links to financial markets. This conceptualization of space assumes exchange value as the principal value, without consideration of other relationships and social values inherent to their existence (Rolnik, 2014). The commodification of space is reproduced in cities by the ownership model and favouring private property over other forms of tenure.…”

“…I explain how the formal/informal dichotomy is embedded within the definitions of informal settlements, and how these definitions are used by planning to exclude and marginalize these settlements by encouraging forced evictions and relocations; and assuming that their only solution is to be formalized by receiving land title and individual property rights. I identify and discuss the key debates regarding land formalization (de Soto, 2000;Payne & Durand-Lasserve, 2013), access to housing finance (Rolnik, 2015;Boonyabancha & Kerr, 2018), and citizenship (Holston, 2009), belonging and recognition in upgrading (Rolnik, 2014;Balaton-Chrimes, 2017).…”