Like affordable housing, homelessness has received its share of media attention and calls for action. Homelessness has also been the subject of innovative programming and research, which are influencing how to understand the issue and work to fix it. Homelessness research also suggests the potential to understand and tackle the affordable housing crisis.
Defining The Issue
Casual observation would suggest that men are more likely to be homeless than women. It turns out that women are just as likely to be homeless as men, but they aren’t as visible. While they may have a roof over their heads, women have no fixed address and no security of tenure. See the intriguing research approach used to figure this out at The Homeless Hub: What Proportion of People Experiencing Homelessness Identify as Women?1
So, women who are homeless are more hidden, staying with a friend or family member, sleeping in their car, or in some other temporary arrangement. There are plenty of reasons to be hidden. Women who live outside are highly vulnerable to sexual assault and/or violence. It is also much more likely that they will lose access to their children and/or that their children will be placed in care. But, as they have no fixed address or security of tenure, the definition of homelessness includes people in this situation, through the term ‘provisionally housed’. For more on this see The Homeless Hub: Whose Responsibility is Hidden Homelessness?
Social Networks Help, Don’t They?
Homelessness researchers had generally accepted that people with social networks are more resilient and able to get help through informal networks when things go badly. This idea came to light in the 1990’s when population wide research investigated social factors that contribute to good health.
As well, in research studies, people often report that their social support network fell apart as part of the process of becoming homeless.
Delving deeper into how social networks help uncovered more complexity. Some ‘support’ networks can actually be a drain and hold people back from leaving homelessness. For a look at how this finding was teased out, see this article in the Journal of Community Psychology: Social networks of unaccompanied women experiencing homelessness
Making The Case
Homelessness began growing dramatically in the early 1990’s in North America and Europe. Even while the numbers were growing by leaps and bounds, governments were adhering to the pull yourself up by your bootstraps philosophy.
Advocates sought to convince decision makers that homelessness programs were worth funding based on demonstrable results and cost savings. To merit long term funding, pilots and demonstration projects were used to identify best practices in the field. This was no easy task, as the situation was (and is) very complex and programs have limited control over the variables at play. Housing First, earned its status as a best practice during this period. See the Canadian Observatory on Homelessness: Housing First – Where is the evidence?
We’ve Solved Homelessness, Haven’t We?
How do you decide when people are no longer homeless? People who had physically left homelessness behind reported that their sense of their homelessness ended much later. Additionally they added the safety, security and affordability of housing contributing to the sense of no longer being homeless. And beyond the housing, feelings of belonging and being part of a community make up ‘not being homeless’. See how one person with lived experience describes it in the post at the Homeless Hub: A Lived Experience View of Functional & Absolute Zero
Why does this matter to affordable housing?
Some thoughts on what these findings have to say to affordable housing:
- We may be making assumptions about affordable housing. It is worthwhile to ask whether we are missing important aspects of the situation. Novel research approaches could help our understanding. With new information, we might define the issue differently. Our programme responses might also change.
- As in the case of social networks, be prepared to test established assumptions. Are the barriers to building affordable housing the obvious suspects or is there more to the story?
- Affordable housing may obtain financial benefit from rigourous research and innovation.
- Understanding the issue from the perspective of the end users is essential to long term stability and program success.
