Massimo Bricocoli

House sharing amongst young adults in the context of Mediterranean welfare: the case of Milan

Abstract The housing systems found in the welfare model of Mediterranean countries are particularly unfriendly towards young people. This article analyses the housing experiences of young graduates in a Mediterranean welfare context. We focus on the growing phenomenon of house sharing as a housing solution for these young people, a solution which has been explored in other housing model contexts but not in the Mediterranean. We find young people sharing largely due to economic constraints and yet experiences of sharing vary considerably, with some unhappily confined to living with unknown peers, whilst others live collectively with those they know and benefit greatly from the experience. We recommend that policy makers must learn from young peoples experiences of shared living and improve the conditions they face in the private rental sector.

Social mix and housing policy: Local effects of a misleading rhetoric. The case of Milan

The article focuses on different uses of the concept of social mix and on emerging criticalities of its use as a planning principle by discussing the results of empirical research on recent housing projects in Milan, Italy. Although the concept of social mix is generally represented as a tool to improve the living conditions of disadvantaged social groups, the praise for social mix in new housing projects may also be driven by the will of targeting the needs of specific medium–low income groups considered functional to urban growth, and by the increase of real estate values that it may provide. In urban contexts affected by a severe shortage of rental housing, social mix strategies may foster the exclusion of lowest-income groups from access to social housing and favour their segregation. Especially with reference to southern European cities, social mix risks becoming a catchword with paradoxical effects in local policy agendas and the topic of mixed communities becoming employed as a socio-political lever for developer-led, profit-making developments.

Un bus come spazio pubblico. Multiculturalismo ed Etnografia Urbana a Milano

The paper draws on a research and teaching project carried out with an international class of students in Urban Ethnography in the MSC in Urban Planning and Policy at Politecnico di Milano (Italy). A particular focus of the project was on exploring the role played by public spaces in supporting the coexistence of a multitude of strangers in the city through the continuous negotiation of diversity and difference. In the field work, spatial and social dynamics occurring in a particular and ‘compressed’ public space - the 90-91 trolley-bus circle-line in Milan - are explored and discussed as a space of confrontation in a perspective of daily multiculturalism.

La casa come servizio? Temi e questioni dell’azione pubblica sotto osservazione

The discourse on housing policies opens to the imaginary of light interpretations of what a dwelling is: shared housing, temporary housing, multi-local living and rental housing solutions that can match new life and work patterns. But several constraints and even paradoxes seem to emerge and to challenge these interpretations which are conquering the debate on the provision social housing. In the domain of social and collaborative housing provided by the third sector, the emphasis on community building and sharing, tends to emphasize the setting of roots and commitment in the local context which tend to produce reluctance to housing mobility, as it usually happens in homeownership. On the other side, in conditions of social and economic fragility, a public dwelling represents a safe harbour and tenants develop a strong sense of belonging which makes them very reluctant to any move. If housing is to be considered as a service, more structural measures need to be undertaken to support more fluid housing pathways.

Osservare da vicino, guardare lontano. Per un disegno delle politiche abitative

L’osservazione ravvicinata del contesto sandonatese fa emergere questioni di interesse non solo locale che interrogano e rinnovano il campo e gli attori dell’offerta abitativa, mettono in discussione la nozione tradizionale di fabbisogno, invitando al riconoscimento dei bisogni emergenti e svelano pratiche che prefigurano la radicalita di alcuni problemi e la forma spontanea o regolata di alcune soluzioni possibili. Un quadro di sintesi, empiricamente e criticamente costruito, ha permesso di identificare un set di temi rispetto ai quali le politiche pubbliche, e in particolare le politiche abitative, sono sollecitate ad impegnarsi. Gli orientamenti all’azione espressi nel Documento direttore per le politiche abitative sono proposti alla discussione entro un dibattito piu ampio che riguarda anche la scala sovra-comunale, regionale, nazionale

Innovare le politiche abitative in una città di proprietari

L’insieme dei saggi che vengono introdotti, compongono un servizio monografico che restituisce gli esiti di un lavoro di ricerca finalizzato alla produzione di un documento direttore per le politiche abitative a San Donato Milanese. Una successione di operazioni di ricerca in corrispondenza di domanda, offerta e pratiche abitative ha strutturato un percorso di lavoro che ha visto una forte integrazione tra il gruppo di ricerca universitario e il personale dei diversi settori dell’amministrazione comunale, con l’obiettivo di individuare approcci e strumenti innovativi capaci di rendere piu efficace l’azione pubblica nel trattamento della questione abitativa

Pratiche abitative e usi della casa

Esplorare e restituire i modi concreti in cui individui e famiglie hanno organizzato una propria soluzione abitativa e si sono variamente collocati sul mercato della proprieta, della locazione o nell’ambito del patrimonio pubblico e fondamentale per esplorare nessi ed intrecci tra policy ed agency. Una serie di venti interviste, centrate sulle pratiche abitative, sono state orientate a comprendere le sequenze di scelte e opzioni espresse in materia di alloggio, i fattori di decisione, criticita e controversia che le contraddistinguono, e la rappresentazione che gli abitanti offrono dell’abitare a San Donato. Narrazioni e casi emblematici sono risultati fondamentali per ancorare il disegno di politiche alla concretezza di processi di cambiamento e di ridefinizione dei bisogni che difficilmente sono documentati dalle basi di dati disponibili o dai dati di censimento

Sguardi oltre le retoriche. Politiche e progetti per la casa a Milano

In the 1990s and 2000s, the rise (and the real influence) of mass home ownership rhetoric was wound up with the massive impacts that privatisation and government reorganisation processes had in the field of housing policies. On the one hand, with the generalisation of negotiation as a key principle in the promotion and governance of urban change, the supply of housing for populations groups considered ‘excluded from the market’ was relegated to old and new players in the social economy and to their role in contracted schemes of urban change. On the other hand, with the emergence and spread of social mixite rhetoric, new urban development was accompanied by a new emphasis on the broader urban and social aspects of urban development for residential use.

Contemporary planning matters. The just city

What are the social reasons for urban planning activity? How can we discuss issues, principles, values and guidelines in urban planning action today? The title of these notes is drawn from a series of three seminars which we organised and held between 2011 and 2012, with support from the Diap. These notes accompany Susan Fainstein’s essay at the beginning of this edition of the journal. The expression ‘contemporary planning matters’ with its double meaning is both a reference to the reasons for contemporary planning activity and a pointer to the challenges of the subject and issues which urban planning action must meet today. It is on these big issues that we have invited Susan Fainstein, Tim Rieniets and Jacques Donzelot to dicuss the conditions to which urban and regional planning is subject today.

Growing Old in Cities. Council Housing Estates in Trieste as Laboratories for New Perspectives in Urban Planning

Growing Old in Cities. Council Housing Estates in Trieste as Laboratories for New Perspectives in Urban Planning Significant ageing processes are affecting many regions across Europe and are changing the social and spatial profile of cities. In Trieste, Italy, a joint initiative by the public Health Agency and the Social Housing Agency has developed a programme targeting conditions that allow people to age at home. The outcomes of the programme stress the need to redesign and reorganise the living environment as a way to oppose to the institutionalisation of older people in specialised nursing homes. Based on intensive field work, this contribution presents and discusses the original and innovative inputs that the case study is offering to the Italian and European debate.