Governing informal housing in cities of the global north

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Governing Informal Housing in Cities of the Global North

Master Thesis: Research Master’s Urban Studies

June 2019

Kamma Winther Kestner

11705558

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English

Abstract

Informality in housing is traditionally assumed to exist in cities of the so-called Global South as slum settlements inhabited by deprived people on the edge of society. In this thesis, I challenge this assumption by comparing the emergence of sub-divided units in Hong Kong and shared housing arrangements in Amsterdam, Netherlands, two affluent cities with highly regulated housing markets. Utilizing the theoretical concepts of Michel de Certeau of strategy and tactics I analyze and discuss whether residents of informal housing can be seen as creatively employing tactics to find housing in two cases of increasingly unaffordable housing markets. Furthermore, I discuss the respective government’s political responsiveness to such informal housing arrangements using Michel Foucault’s theoretical conceptualizations of the power of housing policies over the individual in the two cases. This study employs a mixed method approach using data triangulation to illuminate the cases from multiple perspectives in order to encompass as much of the complexity of the field as possible. Finally, I conclude that informal housing is framed politically as a solution to the pressured housing market, while employed as a tactic from below in two unaffordable and inaccessible housing markets. On the basis of these findings, informality as a concept is political and subject to change according to political interests in the current society.

Key words: informal housing – tactics – De Certeau – governance of housing – Global North – political responsiveness – shared housing – unaffordable housing – urban studies

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Danish

Abstract

Uformelle boliger var førhen forbundet med slumområder beboet af fattige befolkningsgrupper på randen af samfundet i byer i det såkaldte Global South. Jeg vil sammenligne uformelt opdelte lejligheder i Hong Kong og delelejligheder i Amsterdam, Holland i dette speciale og derved udfordre den traditionelle akademiske holdning til informality i analysen af to velhavende byer med høje niveauer af regulering på boligmarkedet. Jeg vil analysere og diskutere, ved at gøre brug af De Certeaus teoretisker begreber strategy og tactics, om beboere af uformelle boliger kan opfattes som gørende brug af alternative fremgangsmåder for at finde bolig i to byer med uoverkommelige boligpriser. Derudover vil jeg referere til Michel Foucaults teori omhandlende den dominerende ideologis magt over individet gennem boligpolitikker ved at diskutere, hvordan regeringerne i de to byer reagerer politisk på disse uformelle boliger. Dette studie bruger mixed methods og data triangulation til at redegøre for de to cases fra forskellige perspektiver for at inkludere så meget af feltets kompleksiteter som muligt. Til slut vil jeg konkludere at uformelle boliger er fremstillet som en løsning på boligmanglen på grund af dominerende politiske interesser. På samme tid kan beslutningen om at bo i en uformel bolig opfattes som en tactic, fordi beboere finder alternative boligløsninger på et dyrt og utilgængeligt boligmarked. På baggrund af disse konklusioner argumenterer jeg for at informality som teoretisk begreb er politisk og foranderligt baseret på det respektive samfunds dominerende politiske interesser. Keywords: Uformelle boliger – tactics – De Certeau – boligpolitik – Global North – politisk lydhørhed – deleboliger – ubetalelige boliger – Urban Studies

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Acknowledgements

I want to extend my gratitude to all the people without which this thesis would not have been possible. Firstly, I want to thank Professor Ernest Chui from Hong Kong University for introducing me to the academic field in Hong Kong and guiding me through the fieldwork and case study. Secondly, I want to thank my interviewees for taking the time to share their knowledge and valuable perspectives on the research matter. Thirdly, I am very thankful to my supervisor Fenne M. Pinkster for her investment and commitment to always challenge me to dig deeper and think critically even when I thought I had reached the limits of my data and my personal skills. Thank you to the professional and personal support from my fellow students. Finally, I am deeply grateful for the continued support and love I have received from family and friends. A special thanks to my mom and dad, Sidsel and Jacob, my dear friend, Ida Marie, and my love, Davide, for never ceasing to support, trust and help me through this process.

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Abbreviations

AFWC – Amsterdamse federatie van woningcorporaties BO – Building ordinance

CBS – Centraal Bureau van statistiek Censtat – Census & statistics department HKHA – Hong Kong housing authority HKHS – Hong Kong housing society HOS – Home ownership scheme LandsD – Lands department

LHTS – Long-term housing strategy PA – Policy Address

PlanD – Planning department PRH – Public rental housing

SCMP – South China morning post SDU – Sub-divided unit

SoCO – Society for Community Organisation THB – Transport and housing bureau

URA – Urban renewal authority

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Introduction

The ideal of the modern, democratic city is a city for everybody. A city in which all lifestyles are accepted and able to co-exist organically. A city in which everybody has equal opportunities to advance and nobody is left alone without the security of a home. In order to reach this ideal of a socially just city, several academics working with the concept of ‘the right to the city’, introduced by Henri Lefebvre, argue that policy-makers need to create policies for and in collaboration with citizens (Uitermark, 2009; Bezmez, 2012; Lefebvre, 1996). This line of thoughts is increasingly inspiring urban planning practices with the structuring of cities happening through the debate between citizens and policy-makers. However, the great challenge for policy-makers lies in creating policies for and by citizens while balancing all the competing interests and needs of the population. In order to ensure equal access to housing, governing institutions need to decide how they regulate the housing market, while supporting groups without access to housing.

From the beginning of my studies, I was interested in how urban systems and processes of policy-making favor the welfare and social mobility of some, while maintaining others in precarious circumstances. When I began looking into the case of Hong Kong I was struck by the contrasts that seemed to exist on the housing market. It appeared that this economically booming metropolis was failing some of its citizens. The city, which is praised as the Western gateway to China, rich in culture and welfare, has a skyline permeated by skyscrapers of ever-new architectural giants. At the same time, I noticed the existence of a grim reality of people living in self-made huts on the rooftops, homeless communities settling underneath highway bridges and cages in flats being rented out for overprices (CNN, 2015; Lau, 2016). I found that the existence of these precarious housing arrangements call for a need to dive deeper into how this city is structured in terms of housing, being that it is full of ambiguities between Western and Asian culture, rich and poor, luxurious penthouses and dangerously tiny cage-homes. Therefore, I decided to initiate a comparative case study of the emergence and governance of informal housing arrangements in Hong Kong and Amsterdam. Knowing that Amsterdam has a long tradition of highly regulated and ideological housing strategies and having experienced the jungle of finding affordable housing in Amsterdam myself, I asked myself if there could be similar situations of people having to find alternative housing there.

The theoretical debate on informality is currently surrounding the critique of how informal housing has been formerly assumed to only exist in less affluent, unregulated cities of the Global South. In this study, I take this post-colonial critique and investigate whether the concept of informality is applicable to two cities of the Global North. Following this I initiate a discussion on how informal housing does not exist outside the power of the state but is defined by the boundary between formality and informality.

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Based in the belief that the dominant political rationality in the current society structure the field of urban policy-making, I will draw out the ideologies behind the housing systems in the two cities (Foucault, 1982). Wegmann and Mawhorter emphasize in their recent article on informal housing production in California, “[…] measuring informal housing at the city level is the first step to enabling planners to harness the potential of this type of housing while addressing its pitfalls.” (2017). By identifying the types of informal housing arrangements emerge in two cities of the global north and how these are currently responded to politically, I will analyze to which extend policy-makers are responsive to the way people actually live in the city when policing and regulating housing. Broadly speaking, how historical and political structures of the two cities influence the housing dynamics and thus actual housing situation for less resourceful groups.

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1. Theoretical Framework

In the following part I will explain the concept of informality, sketch out the academic debate surrounding the use of it and dig deeper into the conceptual curiosities I find relevant in regard to this study. This is done with the aim of showing how this concept will be used in the analysis and discussion of my cases. Furthermore, in this chapter I will present the theoretical lens that will be used in the analysis and discussion of my cases in order to show how the main concepts are employed and relate to each other.

1.1 Defining informality – traditional approaches

Two commonly accepted and much-cited definitions of informality were introduced by Manuel Castells and Alejandro Portes (1989) and Edgar L. Feige (1990). The former characterizes informal activity as that which is: “[…] unregulated by the institutions of society, in a legal and social environment in which similar activities are regulated” (Castells and Portes, 1989, 12), while the latter defines informal activities as those that “[…] fail to adhere to the established rules, or are denied their protection.” (Feige, 1990, 990). In both cases, informality is defined in opposition to some set of rules, which is defined by authorities in the society concerned. Thus, it is commonly used to study social processes that take on a ‘state of exception’ within the fields of economics, politics, and housing. Going back to the definitions of informality by Castells and Portes, and Feige, informal housing entails all housing that does not comply with existing property laws, land-use regulations and building codes. Informal housing is thus seen as an anomaly because it does not comply with the definition of formal economy and planning frameworks.

1.2 Essentializing Theories

Some of the theoretical conceptualizations of informality are thought to be universally applicable. These have the aim to study social processes by uncovering the essence of their being, which is then used to theorize and conclude on the basis of similar processes found all over the world. One of these essentialist and universal ideas within the field of urban studies is the assumption that informal housing and urban marginality are intrinsically linked - that informality is produced by and produces marginality. This idea can be dated back to some of the first studies of informal settlements in the city, which originates from urban sociology in the early 20th_{century. The concept of informality} emerged from some of the early studies of marginalized groups and how these settled in the first half of the 21st_{century. These studies originated from the increased influx of} ethnically different immigrants to societies in Europe and America. ‘Marginals’, ‘the urban poor’, ‘lumpenproletariat’, or even ‘social scum’ were some of the academic terms used by European sociologists and later on also leading American sociologists, namely the Chicago School of Sociology (Durkheim, 1964; Lewis, 1959; Park, 1928). Urban

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sociologist studied the urban poor and their settlements from an external point of view, as was the academic tradition around this time, leading to the development of essentializing theories aiming at explaining the behavior of the poor. This academic tradition defines informality as fundamentally different from formality - thus informal settlements as having a certain quality of space, which determines the limitations and opportunities for its residents.

In the current academic debate, new voices have joined the study of informality as a response to earlier times academic tendency to study informal housing through essentializing and universal theories (Robinson, 2002; Acuto et.al., 2019; Roy, 2011). Post-colonial critic and urban scholar Ananya Roy emphasizes the negative consequences of a universalistic approach to studies of informal housing and its dwellers. She says that these externally defined conceptualizations create a discourse that equates the slum – also referred to as informal settlements - with underdevelopment and neglects the agency of slum-dwellers. She argues that residents of informal settlements are already disqualified as agents of change and even as having an individual choice if they are studied using externally defined, essentializing theories. Roy argues for deconstructing the way informal settlements are portrayed in the dominant narrative as dystopian products of the megacities of the Global South (Roy, 2011: 226). She introduces a new form of subaltern urbanism, which should enable scholars to “[…] understand the inevitable heterogeneity of Southern urbanism, that which cannot be contained within the familiar metonymic categories of megacity or slum […]” (Roy, 2011, p. 231). By deconstructing the link between informal settlements and marginality as a trait that leaves residents without the ability to make active and creative choices, informal housing arrangements can be discussed as produced by and a product of a complexity of urban processes. In other words, informal housing can be understood outside the narrative of them being useless and unwanted. This study builds on the assumption that research into the existence of informal housing can further an understanding of how and why residents choose certain types of housing in the city.

1.3 Informality in housing in ‘alternative’ contexts

As mentioned earlier, the study of informal housing is commonly associated with countries with fewer resources and less regulated housing markets. (Durst and Wegmann, 2017, 284). Several cities of the Global South have faced challenges of rapid urbanization with fewer resources. Combined with a low degree of governance and regulation this could be assumed to cause more instances of informal housing. The assumption that informality is only observable in the Global South can be seen as a result of the developmental lens, according to Jennifer Robinson. Robinson argues that there is an academic tendency coming out of the West within urban studies to study cities of the Global South through a lens of developmentalism, meaning that some Western scholars study urban phenomena based on Western ideals of urban

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development or as Robinson puts it “[…] cities outside of the West are assessed in terms of this pre-given standard of (world) city-ness […]” (Robinson, 2002, p. 532). This entails Western scholars travelling to cities they perceive as fundamentally different from Western cities to study phenomena that are equally different and inapplicable in the context of the Global North, according to them. There is a tendency within urban scholarship to reproduce the myth of Northern formality, meaning that informal practices outside the Global South is overlooked or framed in positive terms. (Robinson, 2002)

However, recent studies challenge the idea that informality cannot be found in cities outside the Global South. For example a study by Noah J. Durst and Jake Wegman (2017), in which they conclude that informal housing is existent and observable in the context of the United States. However, it is less visible and more interwoven with the formal market than in former studies of informality in cities of the Global South. (Durst & Wegman, 2017) Another example of expressions of informality in housing in cities outside the Global South is a study of informal housing arrangements in the shape of basement suites in Calgary, Canada, and rooftop dwellings in Hong Kong by Alina Tanasescu, Ernest Chui Wing-tak and Alan Smart (2010). The authors conclude that: “Clearly, illegal housing not only exists in developed countries, but is tolerated and plays a critical role in economic growth as a key source of accommodation for lower income households.” (Tanasescu, Chui & Smart, 2010, p. 483). In Amsterdam and Copenhagen, Boterman (2011) argues that people use various forms of capital looking for cracks in the system in order to find housing, through more or less formal channels. This skews the access to housing as not all people have the kind of knowledge or financial means to obtain housing in this way. The tendency to frame similar activities of informality in different biased terms is important to shed light on in order not to reproduce the discursive traits of informality in the Global South compared to the Global North. Meaning, the assumption that informality in cities of the Global South is useless and unwanted, while similar instances in cities of the Global North are innovative and influential.

It becomes clear that the concept of informal housing is not solely applicable to cities of the Global South. Not only is it applicable to cities outside the Global South, the research into informality in housing in so-called ‘alternative’ contexts reveals important and original insights. When taking concepts out of their ‘traditional’ context and applying them to alternative cases new perspectives are able to emerge. This is done with a curiosity towards the extent of the concept of informality and whether it is observable in societies that would not typically be associated with it, for instance cities located in the Global North.

1.4 Binary divide

Another important aspect of critique of the conceptualization of informality is the binary line of thinking that defines informality in opposition to formality. By artificially defining

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two separate and mutually exclusive categories, different kinds of living are hierarchized and either accepted or declined by the current society. Acuto, Dinardi, and Marx argue for transcending the disciplinary limits that traditionally link the study of informality to studies of the housing or labor market, as well as, challenge the binary thinking rooted in informality being defined in opposition to formality (2019). They argue that this tendency of using informality as one of two distant poles results in imprecision, limitations and ambiguity in urban scholarship. An example of how the boundary is not always completely clear could be the emergence of squats during the East German state rule, which was both a compliance to the law and the exercise of informal tactics. Another example is the way freelance workers in the creative economy tend to create casual co-working relationships and collectives of self-organization. This shows that informal practices can be useful in addition to formal practices in the organization of everyday life. (Acuto et.al., 2019, p. 9)

Considering the relationship between formality and informality as a continuum rather than two opposing poles is one way to transcend beyond these disciplinary limits and allow for overlaps and grey zones in the concept of informality. In their article, Ostrom et.al (2006) argue for the use of a continuum regarding the definition of informality. They pose an alternative conceptual frame, consistent of two continuums, within which to place the expressions of informality found in the field. The first perspective conceptualizes the informal to be situated outside government mechanisms, whereas the formal is internal to these instruments. In this way the concept of informality is able to show how well the governance of society is tailored to the actions and needs of people. In other words, the degree of informality in society depends on how successfully the government serves the housing demand of their population and whether they provide formal channels in which the individual is able to socially advance. The other trend follows the more traditional concept of informality because it considers the informal to be without structure, while the formal is an organized system. However, the authors emphasize the importance of thinking beyond the binary relationship, thereby being able to notice the complex relations between informality and formality. (Ostrom et.al, 2006)

1.5 The power in defining the informal

Following the critique of the binary thinking in the concept of informality, it is essential to be aware of the power relationship embedded in the state’s role of the production of urban informality. An important focus for critical studies of informality in Latin American cities has been portraying informality as the result of the state’s reluctance or inability to provide equal access to housing (e.g. Turner, 1972; Perlman, 1976). Subsequent research has argued that the main cause for informal housing is inappropriate laws and regulations that legalize the attempt of poor people to find housing (Hardoy & Satterthwaite, 1989). The debate on the role of the state constitutes

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the backdrop of the studies of Ananya Roy, who is one of the main academics to discuss the relationship between state and residents, structure and agency, in the production of informality. She seeks to understand: “[…] informalised spaces and livelihoods as an effect of the state.” (2018, p. 2243). She works with the assumption that the making and remaking of informality can be, and is in some cases, utilized by powerful institutions, such as the state, as a way of ruling urban subjects. The power to define the informal comes to show by the government deeming certain activities to be invalid through the creation and enforcement of regulations. The marginalization of certain citizens due to the status of their current housing result in them being excluded from the rights and protection of the established society. Roy emphasizes the importance of scrutinizing the possible rationale and conflicts of interest lying behind the ruling of informality. For instance, if small, private landlords and low-income groups can enter a mutually beneficiary relationship of affordable housing provision, this might be bad for business of a large property developer, who would rather hold the power of the supply of housing in order to follow the highest paying tenants. In this case, the government and other actors might find it beneficial to define housing arrangements that do not contribute to the logic of capital as illegal. (Roy, 2018, p. 2243)

1.6 The production of informality

The governance of informal housing is shaped by the official definitions of informality in the respective cities. Therefore, a discussion of the production of informality is essential for understanding the individual’s choice of housing and how the housing system and governance structure this. These processes can be discussed using Foucault’s concept of Governmentality. (Foucault, 1982, p. 779)

“Basically power is less a confrontation between two adversaries or the linking of one to the other than a question of government. […] To govern, in this sense, is to structure the possible field of action of others.”

- Foucault, 1982, p. 789 De Certeau’s definition of a strategy seems to resonate in Foucault’s term of governmentality. A strategy is that which governs the individual, or at least has the intention to guide its actions. In De Certeau’s words a strategy is: “[…] the calculation (or manipulation) of power relationships that becomes possible as soon as a subject with will and power (a business, an army, a city, a scientific institution) can be isolated.” (De Certeau, 1984, p. 36). The strategy refers to the organizing techniques of systems, which theoretically governs society by its institutional framework (iBid, p. 34). It is the mode of which all the components, all individual actors and objects, of society are managed.

Foucault’s notion of power he emphasizes that the individual is subjected and limited to a complex system of relations of forces. This system is defined by the historical

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particularity and specific societal domain they are situated within – thus the individual is subjected to the dominant ideology and discourses of the current society. The dominant ideology in the current society shapes the political rationality, which structure and limits the field in which urban policy-makers operate. “In reality power means relations, as more-or-less organized, hierarchical, co-ordinated cluster of relations.” (Foucault, 1980: 198). Thus power being situated in the dialectic relation between different actors suggests more complex driving forces and logic behind these dynamics. “The strategies of regulation that have made up our modern experience of “power” are thus assembled into complexes that connect up forces and institutions deemed “political” with apparatuses that shape and manage individual and collective conduct in relation to norms and objectives but yet are constituted as “non-political”.” (Rose, 1996, p. 38). Coneptualizing power over the individual as an assemblage calls the need for shedding light on all the different forces involved in the process leading to one individual in a certain political and social context choosing a specific housing situation. Specifically, which forces has an affect on this housing choice being in the sector deemed informal. A recent article by Gengzhi Huang, Desheng Xue and Yang Wang (2019) provides a suitable example of how Foucault’s concept of governmentality can be applied to practices of informality. The article studies how street vendors in Guangzhou, China, are being governed through policies that seek to formalize them by immobilizing them in designated places. “Formalization can be understood as a form of spatial governmentality that seeks to guide the behavior of informal economic individuals towards officially desired norms by creating bounded spaces.” (Huang et.al., 2019, p. 1). This can be seen as a kind of spatial governance implemented by the government in order to manage what is perceived as informal and undesired behavior. It is interesting in regard to this study as it shows a kind of analysis, which is critical to the rationale behind policies and whether the intended outcomes are reached. Spatial governmentality refers to mechanisms of social ordering by spatial regulation, which means it is applicable to the displacement of residents of subdivided units, in the Hong Kong case, by either government intervention, rent increases or other kinds of mechanisms forcing people out of their desired homes.

1.7 Informal housing as a tactic

De Certeau’s theory on tactics allows for the possibility of individuals to influence the way the government seek to spatially govern informal housing practices. In his studies, De Certeau seeks to reveal the systems of operational combination – also constituting culture - within which individuals act, go along or find cracks in the system. De Certeau defines how the difference between strategies and tactics essentially lies in the types of operations they refer to. “[…] [S]trategies are able to produce, tabulate, and impose these spaces, when those operations take place, whereas tactics can only use, manipulate, and divert these spaces.” (De Certeau, 1984, p. 30). The power and ability for change in strategies as opposed to a tactic is already evident in the definition of the spaces they occupy, meaning their respective,

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potential space of opportunity. Thus, strategies and tactics essentially are concepts to describe the dynamics between weak and strong.

When zooming in on the concept of tactics, De Certeau introduces the concept of ‘making do’ referring to an individual’s creative solutions in a position of limited power. “Although they remain dependent upon the possibilities offered by circumstances, these transverse tactics do not obey the law of the place, for they are not defined or identified by it.” (De Certeau, 1984, p. 29) De Certeau defines ‘making do’ as a tactic to use the opportunities determined by the strategy in an inventive way for other gains than intended by the system (1984, p. 30). Even though the powerful groups, the government for instance, put out a system of laws and regulations for how to live, how to establish a home in the city, the individual has the power to choose how to act within these structures. The creative and unintended use of ‘products’ or spaces in the city, in society, creates an atmosphere of tension, as these actions contradict the legitimized ideology and power. “The tactics of consumption, the ingenious ways in which the weak make use of the strong, thus lend a political dimension to everyday practices.” (De Certeau, 1984, p. xvii). The invisibility of these actions is partly due to the imposed ideology and the dominant economic order setting up certain norms. Actions deviating from these norms are not recognized as valid in the system. As shown earlier (in section 1.2), the act of living informally has traditionally, in academia, been seen as the last outcome for marginalized groups. The result of this system was that the option for individuals to actively choose to live informally was neglected. Only within the last couple of decades researchers have started to open the discussion of a critical analysis of the definitions of formality versus informality. However, following De Certeau’s theory, the choice of living informally can also be seen as a subtle act of resistance, as the residents are using spaces in the city in an unintended way going against the current system and its logic. Only by allowing for a multitude of interpretations of the reasons for residents of informal housing can researchers contribute to breaking with the dominant discourses and move a step closer to understand the motivations for a certain urban life.

De Certeau’s general belief is that members of society are able to navigate around the structures determined by dominant groups and institutions through the use of tactics. Therefore, he does not view the subject as a passive agent, but assumes the existence of a process of marginalization of certain groups in the general logic of power. De Certeau draws on a lot of concepts introduced by Foucault. However, academics discuss whether these two theorists fully agree on their conceptualizations of power and especially the possibility for the subject to overthrow the totalizing effect of power. In Foucault’s writings on power and the subject it seems that it is not possible to think about subjects as active agents, who can resist or even act outside the system put in place by powerful structures. De Certeau believes that a society needs governmentality based in the dominant rationality, due to its ability to create cohesion. On the other hand, his social constructivist perspective allows him to reinvent the abilities of the subject, making it a driver of social transformation through overturning strategic power with the use of

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tactics. “If rationality outlined options and paths that any member of society was expected to follow, Certeau posited the possibility for everyone to creatively explore the interstitial spaces and to design new paths.” (Wild, 2012, p. 3). This view can be argued to hold more positive future prospects due to the individual’s possibility of liberation even within the most totalizing site of oppression. In this research, I will follow the conceptualization of the ability of the individual to escape and revolt the rationality of society. In line with De Certeau, I assume the possibility that the choice to live informally can be seen as a creative and active response to a precarious situation. However, I still refer to Foucault’s conceptualization of power by understanding informality in housing as a response to a precarious situation of housing shortage - informality can be seen as a process that takes place within a system that defines these processes as unwanted.

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2. Research Design

2.1 Research Questions

The theoretical framework laid out above describes how I conceptualize the main concepts of this study and informs my approach to the field. I will employ De Certeau’s concepts of strategies and tactics in order to understand and analyze the power relations reproduced and embedded in the definition of informality. Furthermore, Foucault will be drawn on in regard to discussing the governing of the individual through housing strategies – how the individual’s possible housing pathway is restricted or made possible by the housing system. The theoretical framework informs the investigation of my main research question:

How do informal housing arrangements emerge in Hong Kong and Amsterdam and how can they be seen as a tactic in response to the housing systems and political strategies in two affluent cities with highly regulated housing markets?

I will seek to answer the main research question by investigating and discussing: − How is informality in housing conceptualized in the academic debate?

− Which forms of informal housing arrangements emerge in respectively Hong Kong and Amsterdam?

− How are these informal housing arrangements influenced by institutions within the housing market and managed politically through housing policies and implementation?

− How can informal housing be seen as a tactic of ‘making do’ in response to the housing strategy? And how is the emergence of informal housing arrangements able to affect the housing strategies put out by the governing institutions?

2.2 Conceptualization

This study sets out to investigate how informal settlements can be seen as a tactic in response to the overall strategy and system resulting in the housing system specific to Hong Kong and Amsterdam. I assume that the choice to live informally can be employed as an active choice as well as a cul-de-sac by the residents in response to the housing strategies and market. I will discuss the interrelations and co-construction of the concept of informality in housing between three pillars: private housing actors, housing strategies and housing tactics. These pillars all constitute the housing system. I draw on the definition of housing system from Bourne, who defines it as “[…] an imprecise, but nevertheless convenient expression encompassing the full range of interrelationships between all the actors

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(individual and corporate), housing units, and institutions involved in the production, consumption, and regulation of housing.” (1981 in Hoekstra, 2003, p. 58).

2.2a Conceptual model

Private housing actors refers to private actors affecting structural conditions that are not determined by the government, meaning the market forces and influence of private developers in the distribution of land and housing prices. Housing strategies are defined by housing policies, implementation of these and other governmental interventions affecting housing provision and equality, such as land regulations and urban planning practices. The third and last pillar refers to housing tactics, which in this case means the practice and actual existence of informal housing. These three pillars are all affected by and affect each other and I am interested in drawing out the assemblage of relations they exist in.

“Seeing informality as a practice opens up new ways of understanding the agency of different actors in producing informality, while also taking into account structural factors, and allowing sight of the interplay between these.”

- Lombard, 2019, p. 571 In line with Lombard, Acuto et.al. (2019, p. 10) argue that research using the concept of informality should keep in mind external factors that are influential on the expressions on informality. “Informality needs to be read not only within the repertoire of the subaltern and the practice of subversion, but more broadly embedded ‘in the architecture of states’ as ‘emerging through legal systems, embedded in negotiations between state regulations and prevailing norms’.”. Therefore, in this research I conceptualize informality as created in a dialectical process between powerful institutions and groups, and actors, who to different extents oppose this system by living informally. I discuss how the individual’s choice to live in informal housing as opposed to formal housing comes about through restrictions or possibilities, such as rent levels, population increases and regulations on the housing market.

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3. Methodology

In the following part, I will explain why I have chosen my specific cases, how my use of mixed methods and data triangulation informs a discussion of multiple perspectives on these cases, how I have collected, selected and analyzed my data, which limitations are intrinsic to these choices, and lastly, which challenges I encountered throughout the research.

3.1 Justification of case studies

Hong Kong and Amsterdam are interesting to compare in regard to their housing systems, as they are two cities with highly regulated housing markets and economic prosperity, but different degrees of housing accessibility. Furthermore, informal housing is not a widely studied phenomenon here as this concept has academically been associated with less regulated cities of developing countries in the Global South. I find it interesting to study the expressions of informal housing in Amsterdam and Hong Kong, in order to discuss the effect of a highly regulated housing market on the extent and types of informality. In Hong Kong I focus on the phenomenon of sub-divided units (SDUs), because this is the most widespread type of informal housing that is known of. The emergence of SDUs has been much debated in the media and the political landscape in the past decade, showing that it is an urgent issue with many people involved. In Amsterdam the situation of informal housing is more fragmented as I found many different types of informal housing and use of housing mentioned in the media and by my interviewees. Here I study the practice of unregistered shared housing practices (woningdelen), because I find it a prominent and curious informal housing practice. Furthermore, I think it can lead me to question and discuss the line between formal and informal housing as defined by the government in the Netherlands and enforced by the municipality of Amsterdam.

In this thesis, I have chosen to follow the approach of a comparative case study, as I believe this allows for new perspectives on the phenomenon of informal housing, through the discussion of the influence of the context it is found in. The importance of situating the studied phenomenon in a dialectic relationship with its context is in line with Michael Burawoy’s approach of the extended case method. This is an approach to conduct in-depth, contextual case studies, while simultaneously acknowledging broader political, economic and social structures as essential on the housing situation for the individual (Burawoy, 1998, p. 5). “The extended case method applies reflexive science to ethnography in order to extract the general from the unique, to move from the “micro” to the “macro”, and to connect the present to the past in anticipation of the future, all by building on preexisting theory.” (Burawoy, 1998, 5). The contexts of the cases of Hong Kong and Amsterdam in relation to the topic of informal housing are seemingly similar as they are both cities in democratic, capitalist societies with increasingly unaffordable housing markets.

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3.2 Mixed methods and data triangulation

In this study, I am utilizing a mixed methods approach and data triangulation. I am primarily using qualitative data to investigate the depth and nuances of the cases but supporting this by quantitatively obtained data, such as statistics and surveys. Professor, studying social research methodology, Nigel Fielding follows this belief as he argues that a deeper understanding of the phenomenon studied can be gained from bringing in different perspectives while still acknowledging the internally influential relationship between the social phenomenon and the broader structures. (Fielding, 2012, p. 124) Furthermore, professor of science education in Venezuela, Mansoor Niaz, elaborates on this by stating that: “[Mixed methods] provides a rationale for hypotheses, theories, guiding assumptions and presuppositions to compete and provide alternatives” (Niaz, 2008, p. 64). Using mixed methods and data triangulation is a way to support and confirm or contest the arguments derived from the data. In this study I combine empirical material collected through interviews with housing association, government officials, and NGOs and literature analysis. Furthermore, I will identify which aspects of informal housing and their residents are emphasized publicly and investigate whether this has an impact on how they are managed politically using policy and media analysis of the case specific cities.

3.3 Primary Data on Housing & Housing Reports

I am analyzing primary data on housing and governmental reports of housing policies in both casestudies. In the Hong Kong case, I analyzed a survey of sub-divided units conducted by the CenStat department. The survey targeted 2,134 buildings based on their age and other spatial characteristics in order to find hidden SDUs and their residents. Half of these buildings were randomly selected as the target group of the survey of SDU residents. Face-to-face interviews were carried out using an “SDU household questionnaire” in order to gain information on the residents. (CenStat, 44p, 2016) Due to the method of randomly sampling respondents the results are exposed to a sampling error. Therefore, they should not be taken as a complete image of the situation and opinions of all residents of SDUs in Hong Kong. However, due to the size of the survey and the randomly selected SDUs the data are adequately reliable to provide a general idea of the situation of SDUs and their residents in Hong Kong.

For the Amsterdam case I am referring to facts on all types of housing fraud from the municipality of Amsterdam (Groeningen, 2016; Jansen, 2019), existent and future housing regulations and policies (Huisvestingsverordening, 2017; Gemeente Amsterdam, 2017), facts on shared housing collected and analysed by RIGO for the municipality (Kessel etal. 2016; Kromhout etal. 2018) and general statistics on housing

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on a national scale (Ministerie van BZK, 2019). In addition to the governmental reports on housing, I have conducted an online survey (App. 3) on the access to the housing market in Amsterdam using the online tool Google-form. I got 35 respondents, who answered questions about their current housing situation and how they obtained it. The survey was done with the aim of pairing quantitative data on housing affordability and accessibility with qualitative statements from residents on the experience of accessing and understanding the housing market in Amsterdam. (Kestner, 2019, App. 3) To support the analysis of policy documents and attempt to detect any bias from these, I have also relied on scientific literature about the housing systems in both cases (Chiu, 2007, 2010; Huang, 2017; Smart, 2001; Soyinka & Siu, 2016, 2018; Wa Hui, 2015; Boterman & Van Gent, 2014; Duijne & Ronald, 2018; Hochstenbach & Arundel, 2014; Hoekstra, 2017; Veer & Schuiling, 2005; Savini et.al, 2016; Peck, 2012).

An important aspect to mention is that all government documents and most media articles from the Netherlands are published in Dutch. I have therefore translated the documents loosely using my knowledge of the language and Google translate. In Hong Kong, this was not an issue since English is their second official language and all documents are published in Cantonese as well as English.

3.4 Interviews

I have conducted two interviews in Hong Kong and eight in Amsterdam (List of interviewees, App. 1). These are divided into three categories based on their positionality and the perspectives on the phenomenon of informal housing they were able to provide. The first interview category is expert interviews collected with the aim of gaining a deeper understanding of the processes behind informal housing and the housing field in broader terms in the two cities. I have called the second category representative interviews since these refer to interviewees, who have an insight into the residential perspective of people living informally and have an interest in advocating for their rights and needs. Lastly, the third category contains interviews with actors representing the different stakeholders working with governance and/or residents of informal housing. These interviews were done with the aim of understanding how the housing provision is structured and whether the official institutions, such as the housing corporations, experience informal housing themselves.

The way I chose to structure my interviews and appeal to my interviewees have a great influence on the level of trust and openness I can establish, which is reflected in the answers I got. I carried out all the interviews using a semi-structured interview-technique following an already prepared interview-guide (App. 2) that I developed to fit the expected specific expertise and sectors the interviewees belonged to. This interview-guide was used loosely to structure the interview. However, I mostly followed the direction the interviewees chose to take by asking probing questions, because I believe

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this is a useful technique to pinpoint and dig deeper into important topics when talking with experts and working professionals. This technique requires a certain level of understanding from the interviewee about what is relevant to the research, therefore I started each interview with a thorough introduction to my main research topic and what I hoped to achieve with the specific interview. In order to ensure and protect the rights of my interviewees I started each interview by asking if they would mind that I recorded and transcribed it. In the end of the interview I explained how I would use the interview and I asked if the interviewee wished to be anonymous or if I could include their identity. Furthermore, I sent them all a copy of the thesis once it was completed with highlights of how their statements were used and in which context. All interviews were transcribed and color-coded according to prominent themes defined on the basis of the important issues pertaining to each case and interviewee. The color-coding creates on overview of the different themes, makes it easier to compare them to each other and in the final regard, analyze and discuss them in the thesis.

I had difficulties accessing people that could provide insights into the political perspective in both cases. I contacted different government departments but was either sent to another department or did not get an answer at all. I went to a housing summit, where the government explained their plan for the housing field in the coming year, but I was disappointed to find out that the whole event was carried out in Cantonese with no translation. This research strategy did not succeed due to the language barrier and the departments of the government not prioritizing or finding it relevant to talk to me. Similarly, I did not manage to get interviews with people involved in the policy-making process in Amsterdam. I wrote an email to the housing department, but the reply was that they were too busy to help out with an interview. However, they sent me several documents explaining the official and newest legislation on housing as well as summaries of the process that went behind these decisions. (Groeningen, 2016; Gemeente Amsterdam, 2016 & 2018; Jansen, 2019)

3.5 Media articles

In both case studies, I have used news articles to detect which types of informal housing are brought to public attention in the past decade and how they are portrayed in comparison to how they are managed politically. Using media articles can also be a way to gain insights into the experiences of residents of informal housing without interviewing them directly. For instance, in Hong Kong there has been a lot of media attention to residents of SDUs in the past ten years and the data collected by local journalists is therefore vast.

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3.6 Research Challenges

It was my initial plan to gain access to residents of informal housing in both cases in order to interview them about their challenges and advantages for living informally. However, I was met with different barriers that made me rethink this strategy in both cases. In Hong Kong, there was a language barrier since most residents of SDUs only speak Cantonese or another ethnic minority language. In both cases, I was challenged by the lack of visibility of informal housing since it prevented me from seeking out the locations and residents by myself. I also had ethical considerations involved in gaining access to individuals’ homes, which were likely illegal, and thus putting them in the precarious situation of talking to me about a sensitive topic with the fear of their situation being known and them being evicted or legally prosecuted. Therefore, I made the decision to focus on collecting data that could provide information from different perspectives on the concept of informal housing. The research aim changed to study the dialectic relationship between all institutions and actors influential on the housing situation and emergence of informal housing in Hong Kong and Amsterdam.

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Case I: Hong Kong - Analysis

4. Hong Kong Housing System

In order to answer my problem formulation, I will identify and study the government bodies and policies defining the housing strategies in Hong Kong and Amsterdam. This is based in the belief that these institutions and the private housing actors shape the physical urban environment and constitute the system that defines, who is able to obtain affordable, legal housing and who has to find alternatives outside the formal housing market. In the words of Michel De Certeau, I will reveal the systems of operational combination (De Certeau, 1984, p. xi) within which individuals are able to act and creatively find cracks in this system. In order to understand the circumstances leading to the emergence of informal housing in these two cities, I will lay out their respective housing systems, the stakeholders influencing the system and how they affect each other. I will start out by elaborating on the sectors constituting the housing system of Hong Kong. Then I will analyze the case of sub-divided units in Hong Kong, who lives there and why. Lastly, which policies have influence on the emergence of sub-divided units and how is the Hong Kong government responding to these informal housing arrangements. Hong Kong has the 4th_{highest population density in the world with a population of}

7,364,883 spreading across 1,106 km2_{(6,671 ppl/km}2_{(World Population Review,} 2017)). While the population of Hong Kong is growing, because of an ageing tendency and the immigration of international expats and workers from Mainland China, the housing prices are sky rocketing, thereby decreasing housing affordability. Hong Kong’s population is projected to continue to increase until it peaks at approximately 8.22 mio. in 2043. (iBid) The growing population demands a continuously higher provision of housing. However, the geographic location of Hong Kong does not allow for the city to grow anymore, as it is surrounded by water to one side and mountains to the other. The natural landscape that constitutes the greater area of Hong Kong is influential on the difficulty to increase the supply of land for housing developments. As shown in figure 1, only 24,4 % of the total area of Hong Kong is built up, leaving ¾ to be wood-, grass- and shrublands. 40 % of the total land area is covered by country parks, which are protected natural areas made in order to preserve animal and flora species (such as mangrove trees), and for open-air recreation. The rest of the area is preserved for water-gathering grounds and other special conservation reasons. (LegCo, 2017) Furthermore, large parts of Hong Kong consist of steep hills and small islands, which are uninhabitable as building on the slopes would be very difficult. The land use of Hong Kong (fig. 1) shows how the parts used for urban development are relatively small, densely-built centers, resulting in only 3,7 % of the total area being for residential use, both public and private.

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Figure 1, Land Utilization in Hong Kong, 2017

4.1 Affordability problems

Partly as a consequence of the disjuncture in the supply and demand of housing, Hong Kong has some of the world’s most expensive housing prices with a median price for an average flat being HK$5,42 million (580.000 euros). According to Demographia International Housing Affordability Survey 2018 Hong Kong has the least affordable housing market in the world for the 8th_{year in a row. Hong Kong scores 19.4 in the} survey on the ratio between median house price and gross annual median household income, compared to notoriously expensive metropolises such as London (8.5) and Sydney (12.9). (Demographia, 2018, p. 10) The average rent in Hong Kong is 70% of the average household income per month, equal to 122% of the individual monthly income. Due to the fact that the average size of households is declining, the number of households will increase faster than the population, which is estimated to rise from 2.51 mio (2016) to 2.97 mio. in 2046. (CenStat, 2017) Associate professor at Hong Kong University Ernest Chui (Expert interviewee, App. 1) points out that the outsourcing of factories to Mainland China decades ago forced a lot of Hong Kong’ers to emigrate in order to keep their jobs. The consequence contributed to the population increase because most of them started families with Mainland Chinese women to eventually return to Hong Kong with their families. (Chui, 2018, l. 150).

The main reasons for the rising housing demand is that the households are getting smaller, the ageing tendency leaves a lot of single, elderly people in need of homes, as

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well as most young people wanting to become independent of their parents at an earlier age.

“So I think many of the youngsters nowadays will aspire to live independently, no matter how small a flat or a room it is, so that’s why the […] volume of demand for separate house or flat has been increasing […] because of the young people wanting to live independently and of course […] because jobs are more concentrated in Kowloon, urban areas, while in the far, remote New Territories there are less jobs.”

- Chui, 2018, l. 170 Chui emphasizes that the problems of higher demand for housing can be due to a cultural shift in demand, because more and more young people want to become independent of their families at an earlier age and therefore need to find their own home. Furthermore, the geographical concentration of jobs in the urban centers increases the demand for housing in these areas even more, which decreases the possibility of finding an affordable house in the city.

4.2 Public Rental Housing

Hong Kong’s housing market is a unique case when looking at the role of the government in controlling the housing supply. Looking at the history of public rental housing in Hong Kong, the government has a long tradition of providing their residents with affordable, social housing. 29 % of the total population in Hong Kong, or about 2.09 mio. people distributed into 765,300 households, reside in Public Rental Housing flats (PRH) as of June 2018 (THB, 2017). PRH is the biggest and oldest public housing scheme in Hong Kong, and its aim is to provide homes for affordable prices for the residents in most need. PRH flats are mostly located in the new territories, Kowloon and on Hong Kong Island, and the stock is currently 808,000 units. The program favors families and elderly, however, the number of younger, singletons on the waiting list has been growing within the past years. (THB, 2017)

However, Professor Rebecca Chiu, who has written a vast amount of academic papers on the housing situation in Hong Kong, argues that the government has not been able to ensure housing affordability in the past decades, even though they control the majority of the housing provision. (Chiu, 2010, p. 303) The PRH scheme does not meet the housing demand when looking at the average waiting time being 5,3 years and the waiting list holding 268,500 applicants as of 2018. (THB, 2017) Even though the annual production goal of PRH flats is put to more than 28,000 per year, in 2017/18 it only reached 13,661. In order to be eligible to apply for the program, you need to be under a set income and assets limit. The limit is determined in conversation between the governing board and the committees of Hong Kong Housing Authority (HKHA), in which different interests from lobby organizations and political parties are represented.

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The income limit for a 1 person household in order to be eligible to even apply for a flat within the PRH is HK$11,540, which is equivalent to 1,281 euros. This is way below the average household income in Hong Kong, which was around HK$18,000 for a 1 person household in 2017 (CenStat, 2018). The idea behind PRH is to provide government owned housing to lower income residents for a rent that is 25% of market rent. In the end of September 2017, the average rent for a PRH flat was HK$1,880 per month. (THB, 2017) Besides being under the income and assets limit, applying households must be constituted by at least 50 % Hong Kong residents. This residency requirement was introduced in 2010 making it difficult for low-income families from Mainland China, which was estimated as the biggest affected group of this policy amendment. (Chiu, 2010, p. 307) Chiu argues that the slight improvement of the waiting time for public housing is not a result of policies as much as a result of the transformation of owner-occupied homes into rental following the development of more rental housing. (Chiu, 2010) Whether thelong queues for PRH are due to an insufficient number of new flats being provided or if it is an increase in people applying due to changes in eligibility criteria or more people being in need of affordable housing because of other factors is difficult to determine. The criteria could be too broad thus leaving lower income groups to find alternative housing, while providing flats for more resourceful residents.

4.3 Liberalisation of the housing market

The structure of the Hong Kong housing market is characterized by rising liberalization and privatization. After the return to China from Britain in 1997, under the agreement that Hong Kong would remain independent as a Special Administrative Region until 2047, the government adopted a free market approach where market forces are allowed to control resource allocation – including housing. (Cheung et.al, 2017, p. 4) According to several academic studies on the influence of the structure of the housing system, competition between market players plays an important role for the access to housing for all individuals (Cheung et.al, 2017; Esping-Andersen, 1990; Hoekstra, 2003). Therefore, I will argue that there is inequality in access to affordable housing due to the market being dominated by private developers. In 2017, a study of private housing in Hong Kong determined that the five biggest private developers of housing owned what was equivalent to 60 % of the housing provision owned by the government. This gives them an upper hand regarding the power of the market in controlling housing supply and prices. If the demand for housing is consistently higher than the supply and this supply is in the hands of few private developers the price level is not able to settle itself automatically based on competition. Meaning, if few individuals has the power to drive up the prices, because of the lack of alternatives for the people looking for a home, the only possibility to stop the increase is for the government to intervene. (Cheung et.al, 2017, p. 7) However, Cheung et.al conclude that even though the top five biggest developers in Hong Kong holds a disproportionate amount of the housing share

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compared to the government, they are holding similar resources, thus, there is no single monopoly (2017, p. 20).

The government of Hong Kong owns all land in the city, which means they regulate the distribution and degree of land use that is allocated for housing. They distribute the power of the land by leasing to private developers for longer periods of 7, 21 or even 50 years, making the re-zoning of land a longer process (Chiu, 2007, p. 64: LandsD, 2017). This also means that developers can develop, use and benefit from the land freely even though the government holds the right to the land. Since 2010, the government has taken measures directed at private developers in the attempt to suppress housing prices and cool the housing market. These include tax increase on property purchases and for property re-sold within six months, as well as larger down payments for buying self-used residential properties. These measures did not prove to be effective since the housing prices kept increasing. (Cheung et.al, 2017, p. 3) This could be due to an ever-high demand for housing, internally from Hong Kong, from Mainland Chinese investors and from overseas investors, who are free to buy property on Hong Kong’s private housing market.

My respondent from SoCo1_{(App. 1) emphasizes the influence of private developers on} redevelopment projects in the neighborhood Sham Shui Po that has a high amount of old buildings. “The private owners, the private developers are also doing it. Maybe they are even doing it at a faster pace. Because of course developers would buy a lot of flats from the old buildings.” (SoCo Spokesperson, 2018, l. 384). She states that there is a public concern that urban redevelopment projects carried out by private developers caters to high-income groups by building new, expensive housing and putting it out on the private market, while removing housing stock from underprivileged, lower-income groups. In spite of this, her arguments are backed up by Ernest Chui, who points to the role of private developers in demolishing old buildings, which were formerly the home of informal housing, such as rooftop slums and SDUs (Chui, 2018, l. 105). “[…] the property developers, all the big force so to speak, are in a better position to argue or negotiate with the government of, say, either you buy the land from me or you have to wait until I develop my land, so that’s why the supply is very much affected by private developers.” (Chui, 2018, l. 195).

The close cooperation between statutory bodies and the private developers in Hong Kong links powerful institutions with companies seeking to maximize profit, thereby the risk of neglecting lower income groups in regard to accessibility in housing exists. The Urban Renewal Authority (URA) is an essential statutory body, when it comes to housing provision and it is specifically influential in regard to residents of old buildings;

1_{The interview I conducted was with a spokeswoman from the social organization SoCO (Society of}

Community Organization) thus she was one of the representative interviewees providing insights into the situation for residents of SDUs. By working for an NGO she might have a bias towards arguing for

Governing informal housing in cities of the global north