Pascal De Decker

GEOGRAPHIES OF WHITENESS AND WEALTH: WHITE, MIDDLE CLASS DISCOURSES ON SEGREGATION AND SOCIAL MIX IN FLANDERS, BELGIUM

ABSTRACT: While policy makers in different parts of the world are worried about the supposedly negative consequences of spatial concentrations of ethnic minorities and/or disadvantaged people, researchers continue the debate about the desirability and feasibility of social mix. In this article, we add to this literature by focusing on the often neglected, but crucial practices and discourses of the privileged in urban and suburban neighborhoods. Drawing on in-depth interviews with 74 white, middle class residents of eight different neighborhoods of the Ghent urban region in Belgium, we demonstrate that few middle class whites actually want to live in a mixed neighborhood. We also make it clear that those living in diversity do not necessarily take up the roles they are expected to take up by the advocates of social mix policies. Drawing on these findings, we propose to broaden the research agenda of studies on segregation and social mix.

On the genesis of an urban policy in Flanders, Belgium

ConclusionInner-city decay took place gradually over many decades. As a matter of fact, improving the inner city is also a slow process; this goal cannot be achieved within one term of office. The city must regain the trust of the inhabitants. Plans must be drawn up, land and buildings must be purchased, and advisory bodies must be established. This is a complicated matter. Moreover, the rules of the game have changed. That is why the first convenant has great experimental value. Both the framework of the SIF and the convenant must be given a chance to grow. If the dilapidated neighbourhoods do not show improvement yet, and if the confidence of the population is not regained within a three-year period, we can only hope that the baby will not be thrown out with the bathwater. Above all, the urban policy requires stability and continuity if it is to thrive.

Housing and housing policy in flanders (Belgium); confusion on the eve of a new decade

It is a common theme, certainly at the end of a decade, to think about the future. For a while policy makers, scientists as well as p.r.-men are selling dates to the world in an obtrusive way, for example the years 1992 and 2000. T h e opening up of the European market and the turn of the century will be unique events in the common mans life and perhaps this explains the kind of magic surrounding these dates. Certainly their nearing explains a lot of the thinking about many features of human and societal life in the future. As often, the best of both worlds is promised. Although thinking about the future is, without doubt, necessary and sometimes provocative, to what degree does the actual overexposure of publications and media-events about life in 1992 and 2000, hide todays problems, such as huge governmental debts, joblessness, homelessness, rootlessness, increasing anomie? To what degree does exposure drive consciousness away from these (chronically) unresolved issues of yesterday and today? This article deals primarily with yesterdays and todays concerns, although tomorrows will also be addressed. In an international context the concept of housing crisis seems to have been reborn (Schuler-Wallner, 1986; Ballain and Jacquier, 1987; Friedrichs, 1988; Marcuse, 1988), yet there is no news of housing in Belgium or Flanders. On the contrary, some politicians (Verhofstadt, 1987) and researchers (De Grauwe, 1983) are telling the world, in oracular language, that the Belgian approach to housing is the best. This is in spite of the fact that about 16% of Flemish families are living in substandard dwellings, which, in absolute figures, is even more than in the early sixties (De Decker, 1988d). Housing problems are covered with the cloak of charity (Goossens, 1987). Consequently, it is not surprising that in international comparative housing research, figures about Belgium are absent (Ball et al., 1988; Harloe, 1985; Roistacher, 1987; Oxley, 1988). Housing research is necessary because of the simple and nearly universally accepted fact that housing is one of the fundamental human needs. Good

Staying Put! A Housing Pathway Analysis of Residential Stability in Belgium

Governments all over the world try to influence in one way or another the residential mobility of their citizens. This article takes the vantage point of why Belgians do not want to change residence a lot and how they actually succeed in doing this. We claim that the framework of a housing pathways approach helps to get to grips with the historically built-up archive of normalizing discourses and practices related to housing and diverse other domains of life. Our in-depth interviews with 67 residents reveal that normalizing discourses and practices on becoming and remaining a stable home-owner mainly support the two pillars of Belgian housing policy (home ownership and commuting) even when these practices and discourses further endorse ecological and accessibility problems. Policies that successfully want to change the relocation practices of people do have to take this archive seriously.

Trouble in paradise? On increasing housing problems in flanders

The survey data for this article was collected by the Center for Social Policy (Antwerp University). At regular intervals, they question a representative number of Belgian families in order to make the operation and effects of social policy measurable. On the basis of that data, this article traces the evolution of housing indicators in Flanders, the Dutch-speaking part of Belgium. After outlining the key issues in housing policy in Belgium and Flanders, the article presents the facts: for several population groups, it sketches the developments of tenure, housing amenities, housing costs, and affordability. The emerging picture is one of overall improvement. Nevertheless, some groups lag behind, while new social groups in need of housing emerge (e.g., lone parents). Age and the number of incomes per family seem to be the breaking points.The second part deals specifically with the housing situation of young families (head under 40 years of age). This population group is (historically) responsible for most new building of houses in Belgium and Flanders. Since we observe a decline in ownership, the reasons for this decline are of strategic importance to our understanding of the level of new housing construction and scarcity on the housing market.

Migration and the Resourceful Neighborhood: Exploring Localized Resources in Urban Zones of Transition

This chapter investigates what makes cities resourceful for arriving migration flows. It is argued that the logic of socio-spatial specialization in cities, as first described by urban sociologists of the Chicago School (but wrongly attributed to ecological forces), can provide cities with resources to deal with migration. The authors focus on urban transition zones as areas specializing in the arrival and transition of newcomers, and use a Polanyian framework to analyze the extent to which these neighborhoods provide the necessary resources. Based on research in an Antwerp neighborhood, it is shown how urban “upgrading” policies undermine the transition zone’s resourcefulness and it is concluded that policy interventions should bring external resources to the transition zone and mobilize local knowledge in order to make the city more resourceful for all its inhabitants.

Private Renting in Social Provision: Social Rental Agencies in Western Europe

The private rental sector (PRS) plays an important role in the housing market by providing access to housing for those who are not willing or not able to enter home ownership or the social housing sector. This chapter discusses the development of Social Rental Agencies (SRAs) and similar initiatives in Belgium (Flanders) and France. It demonstrates that SRAs and similar initiatives can make a valuable contribution to the overall social and housing policy mix used to address housing exclusion. It is hoped that the experiences presented can support reflection on the policy options available for sustainably meeting housing needs in post-socialist countries.

Leaving an Institution in Flanders (Belgium): A Road to Homelessness?

Abstract People living in an institution will leave this residential context one day and have to proceed to a stable independent way of living. This transition is not without difficulties as it turns out this socially vulnerable group runs an increased risk of becoming homeless. Research in Flanders (Belgium) has shown that a considerable share of the homeless population has previously stayed in an institutional setting, mostly in youth care (48.7%), psychiatric (34.4%) and penitentiary (33.1%) institutions. Moreover, the share of homeless people with a history in one of these institutions has increased in the past decades. Institution leavers, face at least three obstacles to a stable housing situation in Flanders: a lack of affordable housing, a lack of access to (non-residential) social assistance and personal difficulties in coping with living independently. Yet, there are several programs that support institution leavers and prepare them for the transition to an independent living situation and legal developments that strengthen their position in society and on the housing market. In this paper, we explore these initiatives and developments in three case studies (Antwerp, Ghent and Leuven). Based on in-depth interviews with “street-level bureaucrats” who work in these institutions (youth care, psychiatric and penitentiary settings), social support services and social housing organizations, we reconstruct the pathways of institution leavers to the housing market, the support they receive and the experienced difficulties.

Onvoldoende voorbereid op het ouder worden

SamenvattingDe Belgische kust vergrijst sterk. Dat komt onder meer doordat een belangrijke groep (bijna-) gepensioneerden zich aan de kust vestigt. De vraag stelt zich of die pensioenmigranten bij hun verhuizing nagedacht hebben over de mogelijke impact van het ouder worden op hun woonsituatie. SumResearch, de onderzoeksgroep HaUS van de Faculteit Architectuur, KULeuven en de vakgroep verpleegkunde van HoGent gingen dit na in opdracht van de provincie West-Vlaanderen.