Okay, So what has admirable Vienna, Austria done now to earn our applause? Only got itself accolades for being the most livable city in the world, from a list of 173 candidates. Not bad for a city renowned for its quantities of social housing as well as its liveability.
Not that free enterprise/free market housing advocates will take this implied slap in their face without complaint. We recently read an article that turned up its nose at the social housing roots of Vienna. The argument: Vienna is not successful because of its government-subsidized housing. No, it’s just because it ‘builds more housing.’ Well, yesss. . . that would have to go with the territory, wouldn’t it? A great chunk of the population homeless for the lack of affordable housing does not seem a winning formula for ‘most livable city in the world.’ Really, it’s a bit like extolling vehicles for, by and large, having four wheels and not three.
Why does Ford build the best selling pickup in America? Because it has four wheels, not three. Why is Vienna the most livable city in the world? It builds more houses. Hmm. Cars aren’t judged primarily by the number of wheels, and neither should Vienna be lavishly praised for the number of houses. The question is, how did those numbers, together with a social welfare framework, add up to the most livable city in the world?
In the case of Vienna, it is not by any simple or straightfoward route, as it happens. The city found a way to build upon a socialist start in the 1920’s and weather a stretch of Nazism after Austria was annexed by Germany in the 1930’s. More recently neoliberalism put the brakes on social housing construction across the EU countries, but not so much in Vienna. Somehow, it has twisted and turned to keep its social housing act together up to to the present day.
Congratulations to that city, and as well to the number two most livable city — Copenhagen, Denmark. That country also has an impressive social housing history, faded somewhat over the last few decades as its citizenry has been captured by the siren song of home ownership in a free market.
Read more about Europe’s boasting rights about having two of the most livable cities in TheMAYOR.eu: The two most livable cities in the world are both in the EU
