Social Housing as a Transitional Tenure? Reflections on the Netherlands' New Housing Memorandum 2000–2010

Abstract

This contribution gives some reflections on the Netherlands' New Housing Memorandum 2000-2010, which was published on 15 May 2000. This Housing Memorandum urges the housing corporations (the social housing organisations which own 37 per cent of the housing stock) to sell 500 000 dwellings in 10 years. This seems to confirm Harloe's assertion that social housing in Europe is only a transitional tenure. Even in the Netherlands-champion of social rented housing within the European Union-the owner occupied sector would seem destined to marginalise the social rented sector in the long run. This paper argues that the housing corporations, being private, independent social entrepreneurs, will be only partially inclined to take the political message of the Housing Memorandum to heart. It is expected that the Dutch social rented sector will remain a differentiated sector and continue to blossom alongside home ownership. Harloe's theory will, in short, not be confirmed by the housing developments in the Netherlands.