To move against the odds: A portrait of socio-spiritual underpinnings of residential mobility decisions in pro-poor housing systems of Tamale, Ghana

Abstract

Housing mobility is an overlooked aspect of pro-poor housing policy debates despite the growing complexities of downstream housing sectors in cities of the global South. Stable housing regimes confer multiple socio-economic advantages on households and the incidence of housing relocation, especially involving very poor families, foists a considerably disruptive consequence. In the mainstream academic literature, residential mobility of the poor is believed to be firmly rooted in the agency of households and the associated housing outcomes arguably reflect their considered choices. Scholars have contended that residential mobility is a progressive practice in which people seek improvement in housing outcomes in terms of unit price, quality and tenure. This notion led to the suggestion that poor households are unlikely to move housing due to resource constraints. These perspectives may have overlooked the complex matrix of spiritual beliefs and practices which condition housing consumption and residential mobility decisions in the pro-poor housing sector. This paper analyses the sociocultural and spiritual enablers of housing mobility decisions in the pro-poor housing system of Tamale, Ghana, using data from in-depth interviews with selected survey participants. The analysis suggests that mistrust and socio-cultural practices in which people seek alternative interpretations to life events and misfortunes in the spiritual realm, deepens the sense of dissatisfaction with respect to safety and security of the homes they live in. We argue that spiritual interpretations of life circumstances create and sustain anxiety in the pro-poor housing sector and mark the subject on which housing relocation decisions are predicated. Housing policy debates ought to be broadened beyond the objective aspects of housing and environmental services to include the socio-cultural contexts shaping housing practices in the pro-poor sector.