HOUSING POLICIES IN THE SERVICE OF SOCIAL AND SPATIAL (IN) EQUALITY (original) (raw)

Effects of the housing privatization process in post-socialist Croatia

Geoadria

The paper focuses on the aspects of housing privatization in the post-socialist period in Croatia. The transition towards the democratic system and market-oriented economy further empowered the privatization of ownership, especially home ownership. Former tenancy rights over socially owned housing were turned into an opportunity of purchasing flats. Socially owned flat thus became private property belonging to the post-socialist type of housing, as an anti-state housing, in which the role of state is marginalized. The state is now much less concerned for housing policy, which is becoming marginalized under market-oriented policy. The changes in the housing standard in the post-socialist period can also be seen in the number of rooms indicator and room size, which both show improvement compared to the socialist period. However, the consequences are visible in excessive privatization i.e. commercialization of the built urban environment, which leads to the reduction of public and gree...

Meanings of the city: Zagreb's new housing communities since the 1950s

Testimonies of the City, 2007

The paper focuses on housing communities built in Novi (New) Zagreb (capital of Croatia) in the second half of the 20th century according to premises of modernist architecture and urban-planning and in the framework of socialist ideology of the state (Yugoslavia). Based on interviews, participant observation, as well as autoethnography, the paper analyses the processes by which newly built hosuing estates grew to symbolise the communities as perceived by inhabitants. The dominant discourses of the city - the functionalism of modernist architecture, the socialist vision of the city, and the statistics of urban sociology - are opposed by the voices of personal, individual narrative on experience and everyday life, which becomes the basis for a different interpretation of the city in the second half of the 20th century.

CROATIAN CITIES UNDER TRANSFORMATION: NEW TENDENCIES IN HOUSING AND SEGREGATION

Tijdschrift Voor Economische En Sociale Geografie, 2009

This paper analyses changes and new tendencies related to housing and segregation patterns in Croatian cities following the process of transition from a centrally planned to a market economy. Housing in Croatia has experienced large changes since the beginning of the 1990s, including a massive privatisation process of public housing, rising costs of housing and an increasing diversification of housing types. New developments and changes in housing policy have to a large extent influenced the development of residential differentiation in larger Croatian cities.

801 Social Housing in Serbia: Dual Approach

1 ABSTRACT Examining Serbian housing policy in the past two decades which has been radically transfered from the communist version of "welfare state" to the neoliberal concept of housing market, this paper firstly identifies major subjects and activities in the field of social housing and systematizes kinds of action related to these activities. Sudden state's withdrawal from the housing matter, followed by the lack of land regulations and permanent economic crisis, caused almost unsolvable problem of adequate provision of housing for the most of the population in Serbia. The initial course, performed through privatisation of 98 % of public housing stock at the beginning of the last decade of the 20th century, took place apart from the few other housing policy initiatives and processes that were unconformably to each other. The state successively abandoned introduction of housing policy, untill it almost ran short of its institutional and active capacities that had bee...

Housing Quality and the Lost (Public) Spaces in Croatia

In the post-socialist period and within the current social transition context, urban and rural Croatia has, just like other transition countries, experienced many changes in the social structure and space. One example is the housing quality which is a replica of the situation in the Croatian society and has also undergone some major changes. Socially oriented housing construction co-financed by the state and the cities is in an unfavourable position compared to private housing construction. In the last twenty years the amount of the social housing construction has been only a minor part of the total contruction work in the country. For instance, out of nine newly planned residential housing developments in Zagreb, the capital city, only three have been completed and the work on the rest of them has stopped and is unlikely to continue. Private construction work prevails especially on the edge of the city and is characterised by high density housing. This type of housing construction doesn't benefit the majority of citizens in search of accommodation (price per square meter is too high, low-quality building). There is also a big problem of the community facilities (primary and secondary infrastructure, schools, kindergartens, playgrounds, green areas, sidewalks, public transport etc.). The existing globalisation-transition circumstances of the Croatian society corroborate the fact which experts of various profiles often point out: ignoring the process of (urban) planning will irreparably damage the space. The city transformation shows the absence of comprehensive urban planning which results in an ever increasing number of random buildings which do not fit in the surroundings. This leads up to yet another important issuethe shrinking and, in some cases, disappearance of public space which becomes the "lost space". In recent years there has been a lot of building in the city core and on the edge which does not quite fit in the existing urban structure, image or the skyline of the city. The current situation in the process of planning can be characterized as a conflict and imbalance between the powerful actors (mostly political and economic) and less powerful actors (mostly professional and civil). The actors who have the political power and influence and the ones who possess the capital are forming an "alliance" between two important layers of the social structure. The lack of civil and professional actors, "lost spatial actors", and therefore of civic aggregation is also present and that is also the cause of public space "disappearance" and undermined process of public participation.

Urban Patterns of Housing in Post‐Socialist Serbia: Between Planning, Law and Reality

2016

Housing has always been considered to be a very complex urban function, where the social aspect of private-life sensitivity confronts the economic fact of every housing unit as a commodity. This confrontation is even more significant if it is known that housing is also the spatially most demanding urban function, usually exceeding city limits and tackling both the urban and regional level. Thus, every society tries to make a balance of these aspects of housing through various measures in legislation, planning and property management. But, what happens when this balance stops working? A good example is present-day Serbia, as a typical post-socialist country with many unexpected and sudden “transitional” changes. The consequences are fragile and underdeveloped legislative, planning and strategic systems in Serbia, which are the important culprits for the present state in housing. For example, the main legislative act, the national law on housing is very old for transitional circumstan...

Housing policy and housing in socialist Мacedonia

ЕтноАнтропоЗум/EthnoAnthropoZoom, 2020

Owning a home as a space (apartment or house) is the inalienable right of every individual. Home is the center of the world for everyone who owns it, and its absence causes a number of repercussions in ones social life. Housing is an important context in the political, economic and social life and depends on its conditions. Regulated housing, as part of the social and spatial policy, is a witness of a functioning and developed country, while at the same time contributing to social cohesion, preserved integrity and well-being of each individual. In Yugoslav times, ideological coloration required equality in the ownership and allocation of an apartment; declaring it a personal investment and a social good, the state had the imperative to provide the individual with this good or to create suitable conditions, adapted to the existing standard, to obtain it himself without much inconvenience. Self-management and associated labor introduce mitigating circumstances for the acquisition of housing rights, but also a series of irregularities and inconsistencies in its resolution.

INDICATORS OF THE HOUSING STOCK IN ZAGREB FROM 1945 UNTIL THE LATE 1960 s

Review of Croatian history, 2020

This paper uses Zagreb as a case study for assessing the development of a socialist city and the housing issues that this development implied. After World War II, Zagreb experienced steep demographic growth owing to a large influx of rural population, and to a lesser extent as a result of natality increase. In 1946, the city had about 270 thousand inhabitants, and in 1969 about 570 thousand. Due to the accelerated industrial development, it needed new workforce , but lacked housing, and its infrastructure was not sufficiently developed to meet the needs of all its residents. Housing construction was based on both social and private initiatives, whereby socially funded projects were multi-storey buildings and the privately funded ones single-storey houses. Due to these private constructions, that is, houses with one storey only, Zagreb resembled a village rather than a city. In assessing the housing construction of Zagreb and its urban development in general after World War II, we are inclined to agree with Davor Stipetić's statement that Zagreb arose as an architectural enterprise that lacked planning in its development.

Between Political Agenda and Common Desire: Genealogy of Socialist Dwelling in Postwar Croatia (1945-1960)

sITA - studies in History and Theory of Architecture, 2021

Postwar ideological shift and change of political paradigm in Croatia, an integral part of Yugoslavia at the time, implied a sharp break with many prewar practices. In this regard, the question of housing was no exception. Moreover, given the extent of the postwar housing crisis, the notion of housing became a crucial political and social issue, and its ideological potential was immediately recognized. Therefore, despite the massive housing shortage, the primal question was not technical – how to make as many apartments as possible in the shortest possible time, but ideological – what kind of apartments should be built? What is genuine housing for a new Yugoslav socialist man? This research follows the postwar quest for an ideal socialist apartment in Croatia. By retracing the expert debates and discussing examples related to different theoretical positions, the article unveils the ideological discourse on housing, which evolved from an initial setup debate between advocates of individual houses and those in favor of high-density collective housing typologies to proposals for the apartment layout that sought to change the way of living and accommodate socialist everyday life. While considering what the description of a socialist dwelling might be in the context of Croatia, the paper draws attention to the discrepancy between what was envisaged and what was realized. The former represents the official, collective housing, promoted and thoughtfully considered in accordance with the socialist modernization agenda, while the latter includes informal, self-built housing that was developed along the margins of the urban space, without noteworthy attention of either architects or the socialist authorities.

(Middle Class) Mass Housing in Serbia. Within and Beyond the Shifting Frames of Socialist Modernisation

European Middle-Class Mass Housing: Past and Present of the Modern Community, 2023

In many aspects MCMH development in Serbia/Yugoslavia was unprecedented, determined by a growing and unacknowledged formation of a middle class in the context of Yugoslav socialism, and a widely proclaimed but elusive social ideal of “housing for all”. Two types of MCMH were the most prevalent in the period considered here (1945-1991): a multi-storey collective residential building, in or outside the city centre, and the individual private house, built in formal and informal or so-cold “wild” settlements. The Yugoslav housing experiment emerged mostly within the collective residential estates. The appropriation, innovation and even invention of different industrial building methods was further enhanced by excellent standards in urban planning and architectural design, exemplified in this study by selected MCMH cases in New Belgrade, Novi Sad, Bor and Subotica. Due to aging, lack of maintenance and the impoverishment of its inhabitants, the present state of this large housing stock is poor, its future uncertain, and yet, its lessons are of vital importance today.