Research in development
The politics of Metropolitan Residence
The politics of metropolitan residence represents a cluster of projects
currently exploring responses to housing and social exclusion. So far we
have examined the scope of community self build activity in urban areas
and its potential for coping with the social and housing needs amongst
excluded groups such as unemployed young people, BME groups and others.
This short study resulted in the CUCR report Self-Build Housing: A
Joined-Up Solution, by Imogen Slater (2004).
Work in this area continues along several fronts. Another piece of work produced
by the Centre was conducted following the London Refugee Housing Conference organised
by Housing Associations Charitable Trust (Hact) in November 2002. This resulted
in a report by Caroline Blunt Housing Asylum Seekers and Refugees (2004).
The Centre was very fortunate in having Michael
Stone, the eminent authority on housing and author of the ground-breaking
study Shelter Poverty: New Ideas on Housing Affordability, with us during
the academic year 2003-3. Michael is Professor of Planning and Public Policy
at the University of Massachusetts Boston. A British Council funded 'Atlantic
Fellowship' provided him with the opportunity to conduct US/UK comparative research
focusing on public housing in the London Borough of Lewisham. This resulted in
two important papers Social Housing in the UK and US and Social
Housing in the London Borough of Lewisham. These are available from the
CUCR.
Other CUCR research on housing-related issues includes:
- We have researched resident involvement in regeneration , for example on the Greenwich waterfront, Barnsley and Newtown in Birmingham.
- We have researched equality issues in the construction industry , identifying local labour and tenant participation good practice models for RSLs and regeneration programmes.
- We have addressed issues around the future of social housing as part of research on Silwood, Pepys and Thamesmead. This is part of our long-term commitment to estate-based research work, including the films Roger Hewitt and Paul Halliday have made on Ferrier and other estates in Greenwich, and ethnographic research which Les Back has conducted in Deptford.
- We have examined BME housing associations as part of the ESRC-funded Democratic Governance and Ethnic Minority Participation Project.