Path-dependency in public–private partnership in French urban renewal

Public–private partnership in urban renewal in France concerns mainly housing, transport infrastructure and large public facilities. The distinction between public, private and civil actors does not concern social and economic development. This situation tends to limit the integration of different issues and approaches in renewal projects. Also, French urban renewal projects do not produce a new type of partnership between public and private actors and the regulatory framework. These projects remain publicly dominated policy-making procedures because of the uneven distribution of resources and assets and despite a policy discourse emphasising the need for a new division of work between state, market and civil society. The current French situation cannot be understood without bearing in mind the history of urban planning policies in France. Using a historical analysis and the path-dependence approach, we highlight the resilience of inherited structures of interaction between public and private actors.     

Regeneration of Dutch post-war urban districts: the role of housing associations

In the Netherlands the regeneration of post-war urban districts is closely intertwined with the role of housing associations. This is hardly surprising, given that the housing associations have such a large share of the market (usually over 50%; sometimes nearly 100%) in many early post-war urban districts. This has caused a growing concentration of low-income households in those urban areas and a selective migration by middle- and high-income households from the city to the suburb. Official government policy on housing and urban renewal is directed at a redifferentiation of the urban housing stock. Specifically, the policy promotes more owner-occupation, larger and higher-quality homes, and a greater percentage of homes with a garden. This implies the demolition of social housing estates and selling social housing. The position of housing associations in the regeneration of Dutch post-war urban districts is somewhat enigmatic. On the one hand, national government is expecting them to take initiative and invest in urban renewal; on the other, government is urging them to cut down their market share. How are housing associations coping with this paradoxical challenge? And what are the current national policies about the position of housing associations? Aedes (the umbrella organisation of Dutch housing associations) and the Dutch Ministry of Housing have agreed upon the so-called great transition of housing associations. Here we explain and critique this great transition, which will hamper the current regeneration of Dutch urban districts. As an alternative we present the new transition.     

析法国社会住宅建设中的公共干预方式

以法国大力推行社会住宅建设为背景，分析了当前国际性的住宅危机和供需状况，以及社会住宅的融资方式和公共资助体系。随着社会住宅政策的不断演变，法国的公共干预模式也进行了调整和完善，逐渐由公共部门主导向公私合作方向发展，进而在协议区开发模式下鼓动私人部门的力量进行大规模的建设。     

Housing Abandonment in Inner Cities-The Politics of Low Demand for Housing

Abandonment of property in all housing tenures is a problem in some British inner cities, especially in the north of England. The paper outlines the causes of this phenomenon and describes some of the social problems that arise in areas containing significant quantities of abandoned property. A principal underlying cause of abandonment is low demand creating, initially, voids and vacancies in the dwelling stock and ultimately housing abandonment. The paper considers the relationship between empty stock and abandonment particularly in the social housing sector. It reviews the US and UK literature and concludes that the UK literature and research agenda is deficient in its analysis of the problem of abandonment. The paper then explores evidence of the source of the abandonment problem in the low demand for housing in some parts of the country, particularly those affected by industrial collapse. Abandonment is also explained as a case of policy failure particularly due to the housing subsidy system and the conflicting interests of central and local government. Finally, the social consequences for communities afflicted by low demand and abandonment are explored and evidence is presented of the severe impact on neighbourhood stability.     

Policy and practice restructuring urban neighbourhoods in the Netherlands: Four birds with one stone

Since 1997, the Netherlands Ministry of Housing has taken a new course in its effort to restructure urban neighbourhoods. Compared with traditional urban renewal policy, the new approach is both similar and different. The traditional policy was to ‘build for the neighbourhood’ and was thus mainly concerned with accommodating sitting tenants and providing social housing. The new policy differentiates its approach and targets a diverse urban population, specifically by reducing the stock of social rented housing and expanding the stock of expensive owner-occupied dwellings. This paper reviews the new policy and questions the conventional wisdom of avoiding spatial concentrations of low-income households. Instead, it proposes objectives that seem much more viable: objectives related to strategic housing stock policy, economic vitality, and the sustainability of the city. As an outcome of urban restructuring, cities may become vibrant, undivided, and sustainable while providing a housing stock for which there is a real demand—four birds with one stone, not a bad, score.     

British home owners and housing change in rural France

Drawing on a survey of 406 home owners in France, expansion in British property ownership is shown to have increased the rural housing stock and to have improved rural housing quality. In all, 30 per cent of British home owners in France have added at least one dwelling to the housing stock, mostly by restoring a derelict property or bringing an unwanted farm building into residential use. Amongst other property owners, 55 per cent have undertaken significant renovations (extensions, major structural work, etc.), so more than two‐thirds of all British buyers have helped raise the quality of the rural housing stock. This has had little effect on house prices, partly because there is little French demand for the properties Britons buy. Given that British buyers are also reluctant to acquire homes from other Britons, a semi‐autonomous housing market is being created in which resales are difficult. This tendency is weakening slightly now, but British owners who wish to sell continue to rely on France being used as an extension of ‘British’ rural housing markets, wherein they can acquire a rural ‘dream’ home that is not only unaffordable but also unattainable in Britain.     

Meeting housing needs through the market: An assessment of housing policies and the supply/demand balance in France and Great Britain

In both Britain and France, for the last 15 years or so, housing policy has become more market‐orientated. This paper examines what this has meant for the balance between supply and demand and for progress in meeting housing needs. Current projections for how housing needs and the demand/supply balance will develop in the 1990s are also analysed. For each country, the determinants of housing demand, both demographic and economic, and the supply position in both the private and public sectors, are examined. Several common issues are identified: the existence of unmet housing needs, problems of indebtedness, the limits to the expansion of owner occupation, problems of social housing finance, and concerns about the decline of the private rented sector. There are also important differences between the two countries: housing output remains at a higher level in France than in Britain; deregulation of housing finance has gone further in Britain than in France; and in France there remains a greater recognition by government that housing is a national responsibility. But in both countries, the ‘marketisation’ of housing policy has meant that housing outcomes have become more dependent on factors external to the housing system.     

编制住房建设规划的几点思考

供不应求是房价上涨的主要原因。我国城镇住房供需平衡逆转的时间点,可能与美国货币政策转向的时间点重合。届时房价大幅下跌的可能性剧增,将给我国金融系统稳定乃至国民经济健康发展带来严重影响。编制住房建设规划,科学判断未来一段时期城镇住房供求关系,有助于稳定和引导市场预期,实现房价与消费能力基本适应。我国住房建设规划工作现在处于起步摸索期,要尽快启动全国及省区级住房建设规划的编制工作,细化住房政策目标;要科学预测住房需求,合理确定住房建设目标;要编制存量住房改造规划,重视发挥现有资源作用;要优化住房建设空间布局,平衡地区间供需,并方便各阶层群众生产和生活;要妥善处理保障与市场之间的关系,严格执行发展小户型住房的有关政策;要充分发挥房产税作用,降低房屋空置率。     

Qualitative Methods and the Evaluation of Community Renewal Programs in Australia: Towards a National Framework

The emergence of public housing estate renewal programs in Australia in the last decade has been one of the most prominent developments in social housing policy. These programs have undertaken a broad mix of renewal activity, ranging from outright physical redevelopment and stock replacement for sale, to community development type initiatives to improve social and employment outcomes for residents. However, while a number of evaluations of these programs have been undertaken, the development of evaluation methodology has lagged behind that of other countries. This in part is due to the lack of federal government interest or involvement in these programs which are essentially state specific. The article reviews the evaluations that have been undertaken in the last 10 years in Australia and assesses the relative importance of qualitative methodologies in these evaluations. Despite a strong focus among policy makers on value-for-money aspects of renewal, the authors show that qualitative methods have been commonplace, if limited in range, and argue this is a result of both the difficulty of obtaining comparative quantitative information especially when comparing dissimilar programs between states. In this context, qualitative methods are more easily managed by researchers and offer more insightful assessments than quantitatively based approaches. The article concludes by arguing for a national evaluation methodology to assist in more rigorous evaluations and the extension of qualitative evaluation methods.     

Good dwellings for all: The case of social rented housing in Sweden

During the last decade many European countries have experienced a decline in the production of social rented housing, and there has also been an increase in sales of such dwellings. However, in Sweden social rented housing is still treated as an integral part of Social Democratic housing policy. According to this policy it should not be regarded as a residual tenure only to people in special need of housing. On the contrary, the official goal is to make it as efficient as other tenures in providing good dwellings for all. In order to popularise this tenure a number of measures have been introduced during the 1980s, such as diversification of the stock, decentralisation of management, increasing tenants’ influence and ambitious renewal programmes. Sales of municipal housing have been kept at a low level, although more sophisticated forms of privatisation have been observable. This paper reviews recent tendencies in social rented housing in Sweden, ending up with a discussion of its political basis and prospects.     

The geography of rental housing and the restructuring of housing assistance in New Zealand

In 1993 major reforms to the delivery of housing assistance in New Zealand came into effect. These included the introduction of an Accommodation Supplement to provide income assistance for housing, the establishment of Housing New Zealand Limited to market former state houses and the setting up of the Ministry of Housing to provide policy advice. These reforms have replaced an explicitly spatial public policy based on the provision of housing stock in particular locations with an apparently aspatial housing policy based on income supplements,. The former state housing construction and allocation programme, however, has generated residential location patterns which continue to constrain and predetermine the choices made by those contemporary households who now draw income supplements. Far from spatially diffusing rental demand, these recent housing reforms show every sign of further concentrating demand and supply of low rental housing and reinforcing the inherited, highly segmented social geography of the New Zealand city.     

基于住房需求供给的居住分异机制研究

文章首先引用经典理论,认为不同收入阶层、城市管理者的行为和决策直接影响到空间资源的分配;然后分析住房需求和供给市场对居住空间分异的影响机制。经济收入的分化导致当前城市社会出现了多样的收入阶层和消费群体;城市化的快速推进、旧城更新以及新区建设都不同程度地激发了住房需求的增长。在住房供给方面,地方政府、房产商以及商业银行以不同的角色参与到住房供给的利益分配中,其中地方政府通过土地出让获取丰厚的财政收入,是趋利性住房供应制度的实施者;房产商作为住房开发的主体,是物质居住空间的塑造者;商业银行通过对房产商及个人提供贷款而间接作用于居住空间,是需求方和供给方的资金纽带,客观上推动社会空间居住分异得以形成。     

The acquisition and sale of properties by social landlords: Justifications and consequences

Building for rent and for sale and buying and selling properties are key elements in strategies for housing and housing management by social landlords. They are associated with making a better use of the housing stock, responses to changing patterns of need and demand, the process of neighbourhood renewal and upgrading and with strategies for tenure diversification. This paper outlines the different contexts in which acquisition and sale take place and draws attention to some of the issues arising from such activity. Drawing on experience in the UK, the paper goes on to suggest that the framework for the adoption of these policies is rarely simply a needsbased management environment and that a range of political and ideological considerations have been overlaid on these decisions. This is also apparent from consideration of other countries and it is suggested that acquisition and sale of properties by social landlords have different justifications in different regimes of housing provision. Finally the paper comments on the implications of different strategies for housing policy.     

Portfolio Management in the Social Rented Sector: Valuation,Risk Analysis and Strategy Development

The financial aspects of social housing management are becoming more important for housing associations in Western Europe, due to changes in their economic and institutional context. As part of a trend towards the privatisation and decentralisation of public services, housing associations are becoming more self-reliant. Government financial support is decreasing and parts of the housing market are changing in response to low demand. To ensure that housing associations run an economic, efficient and financially sound business, knowledge of the financial performance of their stock is becoming more important for their investment policy. In the Netherlands, these general changes in housing policy, management and market have been a prominent feature of the last decade, and have resulted in a variety of responses under the general heading of asset and portfolio management. This paper describes methods for valuation, risk analysis and portfolio management for housing associations. The paper sets out the context within which Dutch housing associations operate. Existing methods for valuation and risk analysis are evaluated for their applicability to social landlords. These methods are placed within the business planning process to show how the methods can be used to inform asset management strategy. Finally the paper reflects on the implications for practice in social housing management.     

The Political Economy of Social Housing Reform—A Framework for Considering Decentralised Ownership, Management and Service Delivery in Australia

Several State Housing Authorities in Australia are currently examining models of devolved management and ownership of social housing stock and addressing reduced Commonwealth State Housing Agreement funding (or have already done so). These changes in the provision and mode of below-market accommodation are reflective of two broad trends: firstly, a greater reliance on market and not-for-profit provision of public services; and, secondly, a change in the role and mode of bureaucratic intervention at various levels of government. In this article we illustrate a framework for analysing these changes by focusing on the transfer of some 86 000 properties from the Glasgow City Council to the Glasgow Housing Association (GHA) in 2003 and also provide an interpretation of how the restructuring of social housing in the UK reflects the political economy of property rights, and the governance and incentive structure through which the restructuring of advanced economies is implemented. We conclude by briefly drawing implications from the British case for Australia. The analysis is conducted in a new institutional tradition that assesses property rights and the provision of social housing, and associated policy goals, under comparative institutional arrangements or governance structures. We argue that stock transfer in essence is a policy of delineating ownership of different attributes of the housing stock and that such a delineation is crucial to the functioning of the emerging governance structure and the ability of stakeholders to extract value from ownership. We draw on a series of interviews conducted by the authors as part of research into the 2003 GHA transfer. These interviews were conducted with policy makers and politicians (past and present), the regulator in Scotland, GHA staff and representatives of the community-based housing association sector in Glasgow.     

Gentrification or social renewal? Effects of public supported housing renewal in Denmark

This paper analyses social change, particularly the processes of social decay, in obsolete and deteriorated housing in the older housing stock in Denmark between 1986 and 1996. These changes are compared with the development which has occurred in similar kinds of housing that have been physically upgraded through a government program for housing renewal.

The study shows that this kind of housing attracts a quick turnover of residents and a tendency towards more unemployed or lower income occupants. It is also used by young people as their first home when moving away from their parents.

It is also shown that public supported housing renewal stops this type of housing pattern and increases the share of households that have high incomes. The changes, however, are not considerable and there are also many unemployed people among the newcomers. These changes depend to a large degree on the size and tenure of the renewed dwellings. In private renting, particularly co‐operatives and in larger dwellings the socio‐economic composition of residents undergo greater changes than in smaller dwellings in non‐profit or public housing. Extensive renewal often results in high rent compared with rent from the regulated housing market in Denmark. As a result the renewed dwellings have difficulties in competing with other kind of dwellings. For that reason residents of this type of housing primarily consist of welfare or pension recipients or others who receive high housing benefits. A minority of people with higher income also use these dwellings but mostly as temporary housing as after a few years they often move to owner‐occupied housing.     

‘From Choice to Chance’: choice-based letting use in forced tenant relocations in New South Wales,Australia

Abstract

The redevelopment of large social housing estates has emerged as a central policy response to address housing affordability and social housing crises in Australia. These projects, often done in partnership with the private sector, are seen as opportunities to leverage government land assets and increase densities to expand social and private housing stock. While extensive research has been conducted on the rationale and processes of estate renewal, less attention has been paid to tenant relocation practices. This is the focus of this article. In particular we explore the New South Wales Government’s use of a choice-based letting program called ‘My Property Choice’ (MPC) that involves tenants bidding via a ballot system for available social housing properties. We argue, despite policy rhetoric emphasising resident ‘choice’, MPC emerges as a chance-based process for tenants seeking to ‘win’ their desired relocation destinations.     

The ambiguity of urban renewal in France: Between continuity and rupture

The term urban renewal was introduced in France in the Loi solidarité et renouvellement urbains (Loi SRU) of December 13th, 2000. Until then, terms like renovation, reconstruction, recycling or refurbishment were used to indicate similar phenomena. Is the introduction of a new term only an innovation in vocabulary, or does it imply new orientations, conceptions and practices? It appears that ever since its introduction in 2000, the notion of urban renewal has been subject to variations in its meaning and in its implementation. A double regime of urban renewal exists. On the one hand, there are the operations officially labelled as urban renewal, which benefit from central state subsidies. These operations aim at a social urban development, and almost exclusively concern the so-called quartiers sensibles, large high-rise housing estates in the banlieus. On the other hand, there are more market-driven, locally initiated and realised operations of regeneration of derelict and run-down areas of the city.     

2009年中国城镇住房发展状况研究

2009年,在危机后的经济刺激政策背景下,中国城镇住房走出了一条充满争议的发展轨迹。住房保障在思路上日益明晰,实施上也取得一定进展,但由于地方政府积极性总体不高,离计划目标仍有距离。住房市场在调控政策刺激下V型反弹,为宏观经济"保增长"目标的实现作出了重要贡献。然而房价上涨过快的问题复现,令住房的使用需求进一步被投资需求所挤压。展望未来,构建一个合理的住房供应体系迫在眉睫,而积极发展保障性住房、盘活私人租赁住房应成为政策调整的基本方向。     

寻求社会公正与融合的可持续途径:荷兰社会住宅的发展与现状

作为世界上住房保障制度最为完善的国家之一,荷兰自20世纪初期以来长期重视社会住宅,即公有出租的保障性住房的规划和建设,将其作为解决城市住房问题、促进社会公正的主要方式,并根据社会经济背景的变化对其发展政策和策略进行合理的调整.与此同时,荷兰也已将社会住宅的规划建设作为解决社会问题,特别是克服不同收入阶层与种族间的居住空间隔离问题,促进社会融合的重要手段之一.本文将结合政策与实例分析对荷兰社会住宅发展进行具体探讨,以期对我国目前的保障性住房规划建设提供借鉴.