Abstract
Recent European comparative studies in the fields of housing policy and spatial planning have been dominated by taxonomical and linear approaches, and by normative calls for convergence toward systems considered more ‘mature’ or ‘advanced’. In this article, we adopt a genealogical perspective and consider those cultures that are central to the shaping of policy. We set out a long-term exploration of the intersection between spatial planning and housing policy in Portugal and focus on the Special Programme for Rehousing (Programa Especial de Realojamento, PER), a programme that has had changing roles (from a financial instrument to a core component of policies of urban regeneration) in connection with political and planning cultures changing in time and space. In this way, we provide evidence of the limited capacity of taxonomic and linear approaches to describe planning and housing systems undergoing processes of change and, conversely, show the potential of genealogical research.
Highlights
The Special Rehousing Programme (Programa Especial de Realojamento, hereafter PER) was launched in 1993 to provide financial instruments to the municipalities of the two main metropolitan areas of Portugal, Lisbon and Oporto, to rehouse the thousands of households living in informal settlements
What emerges from the history of the PER, seen against the backdrop of the planning/housing system(s), is ‘something one might call a genealogy, or rather a multiplicity of genealogical researches, a painstaking rediscovery of struggles together with the rude memory of their conflicts’ (Foucault 1994 [1976], p.83)
We have been especially interested in exploring the intersection between a ‘weak’ planning system in transition, and the convergence of housing policy toward home ownership and regeneration. These relations seem to be problematic for a number of reasons (Carmo et al, 2014): the limits of statutory instruments which are incapable of regulating urban growth but at the same time too rigid to allow for the regularisation and upgrade of informal settlements and illegal allotments; and the dependency of municipal authorities on the issuing of building permits as a source of financing – within a context of decentralisation without resource transferences
Summary
The Special Rehousing Programme (Programa Especial de Realojamento, hereafter PER) was launched in 1993 to provide financial instruments to the municipalities of the two main metropolitan areas of Portugal, Lisbon and Oporto, to rehouse the thousands of households living in informal settlements. Despite having never been formally concluded, the PER had its acme during the late 1990s. Comparative housing studies (see, for different perspectives, Harloe, 1995; Kemeny, 2001; Alves, 2017; Di Feliciantonio and Aalbers, 2017) have focused on two main dimensions: the composition of housing systems (e.g. types of tenure, weight of public/private/non-profit sectors, quality of the built environment); and (national) policy approaches. Within this field, many have been concerned with emphasising the systems ‘lagging behind’, typically Southern European ones, in the implementation of housing policies when compared with more ‘advanced’, typically central European, countries (Allen et al, 2004). In the context of state withdrawal from direct housing provision, public resources have been re-directed toward the regeneration of the built environment (Cameron, 1992), as opposed to the emphasis on new developments that was prevalent during the post-WWII golden age of public housing provision
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