Blog
Urban 20 cities call on the G20 national governments to ensure adequate housing for all
Last 21-22 May, the largest cities of G20 countries – a group known as the Urban 20 (U20) – gathered in Tokyo to convey their joint position to the G20 in a form of a Communiqué. U20 cities urged national leaders of the world’s largest economies to support local governments in ensuring access of all… Read more »
Strengthening inhabitants’ participation in slum upgrading processes through urban story-telling (Medellín)
Source: UCLG Committee on Social Inclusion, Participatory Democracy and Human Rights / UCLG-CSIPDHR A representative from the Committee’s participated last March in a workshop held in Medellín on transmedia narratives and story-telling with a focus on slum upgrading. This workshop was held in the framework of the project “COiNVITE”, aimed at developing innovative learning methodologies… Read more »
Bologna: providing social housing and fighting evictions through solidarity and cooperativism
Bologna is a city of 390,000 inhabitants. As a campus city, it is home to around 35,000 students each year. Tourism is on the rise, and so is the number of touristic apartments in the historical city center. The need for social housing in Bologna currently affects no less than 6,000 people that are living… Read more »
The UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Housing publishes a new report on « The Right to Housing and Access to Justice »
On March 4, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Housing, Leilani Farha, presented to the 40th session of the Human Rights Council her latest report on “Access to justice as a means of realizing the right to housing” (A/HRC/40/61). The report argues that “the global housing crisis is rooted in a crisis in… Read more »
The “Fincas” Project, in Montevideo, turns abandoned properties into social uses
Montevideo presented on 14 March 2019 the “Fincas” project, which aims at recovering abandoned properties at the heart of the city to ensure their social function and put them at the service of the common good. Fincas is based on a consolidated cooperation scheme between Montevideo’s municipality, civil society, academia and the Uruguayan national government.… Read more »
Strasbourg: Affordable housing, a challenge for European cities and metropolises
Co-organised by the City and Eurometropolis of Strasbourg, the Social Union for Housing and Housing Europe, the seminar “Affordable housing: a challenge for European cities and metropolises” brought together European housing stakeholders at the European Parliament in Strasbourg on 17-18 January 2019. Six months before the European elections, the seminar and the exchanges it hosted… Read more »
Seoul’s quest to bring human rights closer to citizens’ lives: Interview with the Human Rights Department of Seoul
Source: UCLG Committee on Social Inclusion, Participatory Democracy and Human Rights / UCLG-CSIPDHR Almost seven years after the creation of its Human Rights Department, Seoul (9.8 million inhabitants) has managed to consolidate a pioneer municipal human rights system. After a successful implementation of its first “Human Rights Policy Master Plan” (2013 – 2017), South Korea’s… Read more »
In Vienna, European cities call on the EU to ensure powers and resources for social housing
On 4-5 December, the City of Vienna hosted the “Housing for All” Conference, a forum to present a European Action Plan to implement concrete policies for the right to housing. The gathering also kicked-off a campaign by European cities to put housing high on the agenda of the upcoming European election. Vienna, Barcelona and Lisbon, as promoters… Read more »
The Community of Practice on Housing meets in Madrid to define a joint strategy
Signatories of the Declaration of Cities for Adequate Housing met in Madrid last 7 November to discuss the way forward in their joint quest for the right to housing. Barcelona, Mexico City, Montevideo, Plaine Commune, Seoul, Strasbourg, Taipei, and Terrassa took part in the first meeting of the Community of Practice on Housing. Participants agreed… Read more »
Social production of habitat: Promoting new partnerships on housing between public administrations and local inhabitants?
(Source: UCLG Committee on Social Inclusion, Participatory Democracy and Human Rights / UCLG-CSIPDHR) Last June 11 and 12 June, Urbamonde held in Geneva a meeting of civil society organizations working on the “social production of habitat”. That is the case of initiatives such as Slum Dwellers International, the Asian Coalition for Housing Rights, FUNDASAL or… Read more »