1st Edition

The Tenants' Movement Resident involvement, community action and the contentious politics of housing

By Quintin Bradley Copyright 2014
    200 Pages 10 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    200 Pages 10 B/W Illustrations
    by Routledge

    The Tenants' Movement is both a history of tenant organization and mobilization, and a guide to understanding how the struggles of tenant organizers have come to shape housing policy today. Charting the history of tenant mobilization, and the rise of consumer movements in housing, it is one of the first cross-cultural, historical analyses of tenants’ organizations’ roles in housing policy.

    The Tenants' Movement shows both the past and future of tenant mobilization. The book’s approach applies social movement theory to housing studies, and bridges gaps between research in urban sociology, urban studies, and the built environment, and provides a challenging study of the ability of contemporary social movements, community campaigns and urban struggles to shape the debate around public services and engage with the unfinished project of welfare reform.

    Contents Chapter 1 The Tenants Movement Chapter 2 The Hidden History of Tenants Chapter 3 Power and Participation Chapter 4 Constructing a Tenant Voice Chapter 5 Tenant localism and democracy Chapter 6 Mobilising Tenants Chapter 7 Conclusion Appendix 1 Transcription Key Appendix 2 Focus Groups and Interviews References Index

    Biography

    Quintin Bradley is Senior Lecturer in Planning and Housing Studies at Leeds Metropolitan University, UK.

    "[T]his book represents a rich and important contribution to the study of social housing governance."Housing Studies, Hal Pawson, University of New South Wales

    "This book is definitely worth reading for academics interested in social movement theory and struggles for a decommodified housing system. Beyond that, housing activists from around the world can certainly benefit from the experience the English tenants’ movement has accumulated in decades of social struggles and now presented in a well-written and condensed form by Quintin Bradley."Sebastian Schipper, Bauhaus-Universitat Weimar, Germany