Special issues

Introduction to the Special Issue: The View from Housing - The Contributions of Housing Research to Social and Behavioural Theory

Although academic definitions of ‘corporatism’ differ, the concept is generally about organisational influence on state politics. Around 1980, Sweden was regarded as the archetype of welfare-state corporatism, but around the turn of the millennium the broad representation of organised interests in state politics was largely abolished. However, in the housing sector, strong interest organisations have continued to play a dominant and institutionalised role. Rents are negotiated collectively between organisations of estate owners and tenants, and these organisations also have strong influence on rental legislation and on housing policy more generally. We argue that this system should be seen as corporatist and to that end suggest a somewhat modified version of Philippe Schmitter’s well-established definition of corporatism. We claim that our ‘view from housing’ may contribute to the increased relevance of corporatism theory also in studies of other welfare sectors where market distribution is increasingly important.

This article aims to theorise the housing governance of vulnerable debtor populations from a relational perspective, developing the affective attachment concept. While the emotionality of housing has been studied in housing research, the relational understanding of affects/emotions offers a fruitful perspective for understanding the interface of power (re)production between subjects and structures. The argument is supported by a literature review and excerpts from a qualitative analysis of 30 interviews with overindebted people and 20 institutional actors which demonstrate the relevance of emotions in attachment to the precarious housing market. Linking the relevance of affective attachment with moral discourses, the article shows the potential to better understand how the (self)control and (self)discipline–(self)governance–of vulnerable people could be performed by morally modulated affects and emotions.

One of the most researched and proven behavioural biases is the endowment effect, which manifests in people''s higher valuation of goods they own relative to goods they do not. Loss aversion is considered the main cause of the endowment effect because of the assumption that losses loom larger than gains. Whether decisions are framed as either gains or losses depends on the adopted reference point, which is usually taken as current ownership. Mainstream behavioural economics also postulates that the decision-making process involves multiple reference points. This study aims to provide new arguments in favour of the existence of multiple reference points affecting the formation of the endowment effect based on theoretical reflections and empirical evidence from the housing market. A critical review of the literature, as well as an empirical study, revealed that there are multiple reference points in the housing market, the interaction between which leads to the endowment effect.