Social Movements against Housing Financialization

We invite contributions to the special issue of Critical Housing Analysis entitled

Social Movements against Housing Financialization

edited by Gertjan Wijburg (KU Leuven, Belgium) and Richard Waldron (Queen's University Belfast, UK).

The intention of this special issue is to develop critical housing scholarship on the under-researched impacts of social movements organizing local, national or global resistance against financialized housing practice, the rise of for-profit landlordism and rent-seeking investment in general. Social movements can campaign for social justice-seeking tenant mobilization, increased media attention or enforce a shift in financial market regulation, national or local housing policy, housing rights and urban planning. Otherwise, they can contribute to the diffusion of new ‘de-financialized’ housing practices which challenge the status quo and contribute to more inclusive, energy efficient and affordable living forms.

Contributors may explore theoretical perspectives on social movements in relation to housing financialization and commodified housing practice; offer empirical data on specific impacts of social resistance in financializing cities of the Global North and South; or examine how social movements impact urban politics, national and local housing policy, planning and rent regulations; or the myriad ways in which they challenge the status quo and introduce new modes of habitat. Contributions which consider the political debates / dimensions of municipal governance surrounding social movement initiatives or explore the potential for community based / cooperative forms of housing offering income generating or neighbourhood-stabilizing opportunities for local residents are also welcome.

Contributions may focus on a specific city/country or be comparative in scope. However, papers should not be simply descriptive. All contributions should have potentially wider policy implications so conclusions or lessons learned should be relevant for a broad group of readers from different countries.

Critical Housing Analysis publishes only short papers that undergo quick double blind peer review by at least two independent experts in the topic of the paper who are not in close working, institutional or personal relations with the author. Therefore, the contributions to the special issue must be no longer than 3,500 words, including a short abstract and references.

Critical Housing Analysis guarantees that authors are informed of the decision to publish within seven weeks of submission of the paper. The author keeps a right to re-publish the paper in expanded form in a standard academic journal later, but the authorship rights are already protected by unique DOI code from publication with Critical Housing Analysis.

More information on the publisher standards and previous articles published in Critical Housing Analysis are available at https://www.housing-critical.com

Potential contributors should submit an abstract to gertjan.wijburg@kuleuven.be and r.waldron@qub.ac.uk by August 14, 2023 at the latest. The deadline for submission of full papers to the Special Issue is January 15, 2024. The issue (no. 2 of 2024) is planned to be released by July 2024.

Full papers should be submitted through https://housing-critical.com/submit-your-paper/ after registration of the corresponding author.