NEW ACADEMIC PUBLICATIONS

Kintrea, K. and Muir, J. (2009) ‘Integrating Ballymun? Flawed progress in Ireland’s largest estate regeneration scheme’, Town Planning Review 80(1): 83-108.

NEW ACADEMIC PUBLICATIONS

Bramley, G. & Watkins, D. (2008) Public Service Costs of Child Poverty, Joseph Rowntree Foundation: York http://www.jrf.org.uk/publications/public-service-costs-child-poverty

Heriot-Watt University, Edinburgh University & ECA School of Architecture (2008) Design at the Heart of House-Building, Scottish Government Social Research http://www.scotland.gov.uk/Publications/2007/11/08110758/0

Levin, E. and Pryce, G. (2009) A regional house price model of excess demand for housing, RICS Research Report May 2009, ISBN: 978-1-84219-510-9

Pawson, H. & Sosenko, F. (2008) Sector Restructuring; Housing Corporation Sector Study 61; http://www.housingcorp.gov.uk/server/show/nav.001010001005

Pawson, H. & Watkins, D. (2008) Analysing Key Trends in the Supply and Distribution of Social Housing Lettings; Housing Corporation Sector Study 62 http://www.housingcorp.gov.uk/server/show/nav.001010001005

Pryce, G. (2009) Responding to the Impending Repossessions Crisis, Housing Analysis and Surveys Expert Panel Papers, 7, Communities and Local Government.

NEW ACADEMIC PUBLICATIONS

McIntyre, Z. and McKee, K. (2008) “Governance and Sustainability in Glasgow: connecting symbolic capital and housing consumption to regeneration”, Area 40 (4): 481-490.

NEW ACADEMIC PUBLICATIONS

Casey, R., Goudie, R and Reeve, K (2008) ‘Homeless Women in Public Spaces: Strategies of Resistance’, Housing Studies, Vol.23, No.6, 899-916.

The future of social housing - the new book from Shelter

£15 + p&p

Written by leading housing academics, The future of social housing is the brand new title published by Shelter. In the wake of wide-ranging debates about the role and purpose of social housing in the twenty-first century, this timely collection of essays takes an in-depth look at the strengths of the social housing sector and the key challenges that it faces.
Order online at www.shelter.org.uk/futuresocialhousing; or email publications@shelter.org.uk or call 0844 515 2036 for other order options.

If you are a lecturer and would like an inspection copy, please email publications@shelter.org.uk for further details.

News from CLG

As part of CLG's Analysis Week, Michael Ball, Mark Stephens and other members of the Housing Markets and Planning and Housing Analysis and Surveys gave a series of short presentations on aspects of the credit crunch and the housing market. These were well attended and well received by CLG analysts and policy staff.

Recent publications include:
Housing in England
Statutory Homelessness statistics

The "Cole Report" Published

The government has published the report of the panel of independent stakeholders chaired by Professor Ian Cole, the Director of CRESR (Sheffield Hallam University), on the future regulation of the social housing sector in England. The report makes a series of recommendations to bring both local authorities and housing associations within the new regulatory framework being established by the Tenants Services Authority. The Cole Report is available from:
www.communities.gov.uk/publications/housing/thecolereport

More New Titles in the CIH and HSA Book Series

In addition to the new book ‘Housing, the Environment and Our Changing Climate’, noted last month, CIH is pleased to report that the long-awaited new edition of the guide by Douglas Robertson to housing research, ‘Looking into Housing’, will shortly go to print and will be available from September. The previous edition, now unavailable for some time, was constantly in demand and was reprinted. The new edition has been completely revised to reflect current research techniques. For details of new publications see www.cih.org/publications

Also in the pipeline are new titles on homelessness (edited by Suzanne Fitzpatrick) and on housing market renewal (by Peter Lee and Ed Ferrari). Suggestions for new titles are always welcome (to Peter Williams at consultpwilliams@btinternet.com or to John Perry at john.perry@cih.org).

Social housing and worklessness

A new report presents the key messages for policy to emerge from a study commissioned by the Department of Work and Pensions that explored possible explanations for the relatively high levels of worklessness among tenants in social housing. Contributors include Del Roy Fletcher, Tony Gore, Kesia Reeve and David Robinson from CRESR (Sheffield Hallam University).
The report is available from the DWP website.

Housing, the Environment and Our Changing Climate

The actions of housing managers and their residents will be key to cutting carbon emissions from UK homes, which account for 27 per cent of the nation’s total emissions. The Chartered Institute of Housing (CIH) has produced a new book in its joint series with the HSA, Housing, the Environment and Our Changing Climate, which we hope will lay the foundations for a change in attitude, so that anyone involved in housing and communities will recognise the urgency of making our homes fit for the future

The edited volume brings together contributions from academics, the housing sector and outside commentators to present the first rounded view of the importance of housing in tackling climate change. It has a Foreword by Tony Juniper of Friends of the Earth.

“Housing, the Environment and Our Changing Climate” by Sinn, C. and Perry, J. (eds) is published by the Chartered Institute of Housing. See their website for more details.

Academic Publications

Casey, R. and Flint, J. (2008) 'Governing through localism, contract and community: evidence from anti-social behaviour strategies in Scotland' in Squires, P. (2008) ASBO Nation: The criminalisation of nuisance (Bristol: Policy Press), pp. 103-116.
This book chapter explores how forms of accountability, partnership and contract play out within anti-social behaviour strategies in Scotland. Two key dimensions are examined: the dual and simultaneous processes of centralisation and localism within governance frameworks; and the contested concepts of citizenship and responsibility for governing anti-social behaviour, mediated by the interface between formal and informal mechanisms of social control. The chapter concludes by arguing that the ambiguities of roles, limited scales of intervention, and the resistance of actors create a disjunction between strategy rationales and delivery on the ground.
Parr, S. and Nixon, J. (2008) 'Rationalising family intervention projects' in Squires, P. (2008) ASBO Nation: The criminalisation of nuisance (Bristol: Policy Press), pp. 161-178.
In this chapter, we draw on policy texts, newspaper reporting and rich data from a three year qualitative study of six Family Intervention Projects (FIPs) to explore the discursive field in which the projects are conceptualised. In so doing, we unpack the political rationality that underpins and shapes FIP policy, and make explicit the moral justifications that are employed, the way in which target families are problematised and the presupposed distribution of tasks among governing authorities. While locating our analysis within a governmentality framework, we accept that processes of governance are fraught with contradiction and discontinuities with the outcome by no means certain. The chapter therefore also focuses on the ways in which the FIP political rationality is mediated, contested and challenged by reference to media representations and the views of project staff and partner agencies on the role of FIPs in the governance of conduct.

Powell, R. (2008) “Understanding the Stigmatization of Gypsies: Power and the Dialectics of (Dis)identification”, Housing, Theory and Society 25 (2): 87-109.Most theorizations on the stigmatization of Gypsies have centred on structural factors: issues of race, ethnicity, the role of the media and the general incompatibility of nomadism with a sedentary mode of existence. Drawing on the work of Norbert Elias this paper contends that a focus on the power differentials which characterize everyday social relations between Gypsies and the settled population can enhance our understanding of the stigmatization of the former. The paper focuses on the dialectics of identification articulated by Gypsies in relation to their perceived collective similarity and difference, which is crucial in understanding their marginal position in British society. Using empirical data, the paper then explores the ways in which power differentials shape the social relations between Gypsies and the settled population, and how stigmatization serves as a potent weapon in maintaining the weak position of British Gypsies.

McKee, K. and Cooper, V. (2003) “The Paradox of Tenant Empowerment: regulatory and liberatory possibilities?” Housing, Theory and Society 25 (2): 132-146.Tenant empowerment has traditionally been regarded as a means of realising democratic ideals: a quantitative increase in influence and control, which thereby enables "subjects" to acquire the fundamental properties of "citizens". By contrast governmentality, as derived from the work of Michel Foucault, offers a more critical appraisal of the concept of empowerment by highlighting how it is itself a mode of subjection and means of regulating human conduct towards particular ends. Drawing on empirical data about how housing governance has changed in Glasgow following its 2003 stock transfer, this paper adopts the insights of governmentality to illustrate how the political ambition of community ownership has been realized through the mobilization and shaping of active tenant involvement in the local decision-making process. In addition, it also traces the tensions and conflict inherent in the reconfiguration of power relations post-transfer for "subjects" do not necessarily conform to the plans of those that seek to govern them.

Northern Ireland Housing Executive

Northern Ireland Housing Market Review and Perspectives 2008-11

The Northern Ireland Housing Executive recently published its twelfth annual Housing Market Review and Perspectives, which provides comprehensive information and analysis on the region’s housing market across all tenures and informs the Executive’s strategic intervention in the market.

Among its findings, the Review reports:

• A growing waiting list for social housing;


• Continuing difficulties for first time buyers;


• The end of the boom in house prices;


• Progress in housing standards;


• Progress on energy efficiency; and


• Growing levels of fuel poverty due to rising fuel costs.;

The Review and Perspectives draws on and complements a number of other ongoing and completed research projects, including the findings of the 2006 Northern Ireland House Condition Survey (full report due to be published later this year) and house price and affordability indicators such as the report on Housing Market Affordability in Northern Ireland 2006/07 and the Quarterly House Price Index series . The full Housing Market Review and Perspectives Report is also available on the Housing Executive’s web site.

Housing Research Bulletin

The Housing Research Bulletin, launched in 2005 and published twice yearly, aims to highlight the latest research on important housing issues, as well as providing signposts towards other useful, topical information produced by Government departments, universities and other bodies. It is distributed widely in Northern Ireland, and is also available to download from the Executive’s web site.

The sixth edition was published earlier this year, providing an update on some of the organisation’s most recent research activity, including:

• Headline results from the 2006 Northern Ireland House Condition Survey (housing stock, tenure, age and unfitness, based on a sample of 7,250 dwellings);


• Summary findings from the latest phase of a partnership project with the University of Ulster looking at the characteristics of the private rented sector in Northern Ireland; and


• A baseline study of segregation on Housing Executive estates in Belfast, carried out for the Housing Executive by Queen’s University.;

The Bulletin is available to view at www.nihe.gov.uk/publications/reports/housingbulletin6.pdf . Previous editions can also be downloaded at www.nihe.gov.uk/research2/HRB.asp

'Whaur are you Fae' - Neighbourhood identity in Stirling, over time and place

Douglas Roberson, James Smyth, Ian McIntosh

A new study examining neighbourhood identity has just been published by JRF. Neighbourhood identity is core to understanding both diversity and cohesion. Such an identity is established at a very early stage of each neighbourhood’s history, and proved resilient to change. Such identities were underpinned by social class and status – which was sometimes based on historic male employment patterns – as well as physical characteristics, including housing style, type and tenure. There was evidence of internal differentiation in each neighbourhood, often through minute differences between households, streets and, in the past, male occupations. It was also shown that external perceptions of a neighbourhoods identity were often stronger and more of a caricature than those held by people who lived there, and this has major implications in relation to their perceived popularity.

Family networks, friends and neighbours were given differing degrees of importance in people’s notions of what created a sense of community, and consequently their perceptions of cohesion or diversity. However, their presence helped sustain a sense of community and people’s own sense of involvement within that community. Notions of community were constructed through familiar, everyday social interactions within various localised settings, which were often enough to give people a powerful sense of place attachment and belonging. In each neighbourhood, respondents interviewed for the study suggested notions of community were declining in response to an ever-increasing individualism. Many respondents saw women as playing the core role in sustaining community, through their family and child-rearing roles in local neighbourhoods. With greater numbers of women now working, this role in binding communities was felt to have declined. Similar cohesion influences were provided by elderly residents who held a historic perspective as to what the community had once been, a resource draw on by many current residents.

The report, based on a recent JRF funded project, details the construction of neighbourhood identity, its relationship to social class and status, through a blending of historic and qualitative research methods. The three neighbourhoods examined were located within the Scottish city of Stirling. This work has major implications for renewal programmes, the creation of 'mixed communities' as well as planning and governance policies. A copy of the full report can be downloaded from: http://www.jrf.org.uk/bookshop/details.asp?pubID=946