| dc.description.abstract |
"Urban land for housing issues in the Global South are more severe than ever. The rapid urban
transition in emerging and developing countries results in a considerable and growing weight of
precarious housing, in term of hazardous/inappropriate sites, legal status and construction qualities.
Indeed, freehold land ownership, as defined by the Civil Code, and the land market to which it is linked,
reinforce inequalities and is inaccessible to many urban dwellers. Then, vulnerable urban dwellers have
no other option than accessing land through informal channel, being then under the threat of eviction
by both public authorities and the market. No market-based approach (land sharing nor affordable
housing or public housing) has proved able to significantly reduce the spread of slum condition. In
parallel, time is at a massive dismantling of commons under the pressure of land commodification and
environmental enclosures. The global urban sprawl is a major factor explaining the disappearance of
commons. Within cities, a more commercial management of municipal public goods increase the
trend.
Our research program questions where and under which socio-political conditions alternative
forms to private individualisation of property (titling and subdivision of land) are implemented to
popular demand for housing and/or upgrading of existing precarious neighbourhoods. We use a
commons perspective on land issues, giving priority to land use above land ownership, and to general
interested prior to private interest of land owner, and preventing speculation.
This paper presents preliminary results of our research programme on land-based urban
commons for housing in the Global South, supported by the French Development Agency (2017-2019).
In this research, urban land-based commons designate a range of situations where possession of a
piece of land has a collective dimension and where land-use rights are organized, at least partially, by
the community. They represent alternatives to individual private property and are considered as a
mean of realizing the “social function of land”, namely a distribution of, and access to, land for
purposes of housing for all.
This research is based on several case studies in the Global South, conducted by local researchers:
housing cooperatives in Burkina Faso, Community Land Trust-CLT in Kenya, collective land
regularization processes in India, collective positive acquisition processes in Brazil, evolution of ejidos
in Mexico, traditional land-based commons in New Caledonia, and housing cooperatives in Uruguay.
In this paper, we present preliminary results. First, we highlight the diversity of land-based urban
commons for housing, showing what is put in common – or not – within the housing development
process. Second, we examine to what extent the land-based commons for housing contribute to fulfill
the social function of land on an individual level (need for affordability, security of tenure, and
participation). Third, we analyze issues of scale and reproduction in time and space." |
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