2003/07/01 by Keith Jacobs, KEITH JACOBS, Jim Kemeny +3 · 3 citations
Economics, Econometrics and Finance · Health Professions · Social Sciences · #Homelessness and Social Issues #Housing, Finance, and Neoliberalism #Political and Economic history of UK and US
paper · doi:10.1080/02673030304252
openalex publication_date 2003/07/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29
A constructionist approach to the study of social problems and housing policy provides a theoretically informed means of analysing the ways in which housing policy is formulated and implemented. Yet despite a strong commitment by housing researchers to policy relevance, constructionist studies of how specific social problems are generated and deployed have so far made only a limited impact on housing research. The paper addresses this lacuna by first discussing important literature and the key conceptual issues in this field of study. This is followed by a discussion of two examples from recent UK housing policy (the shift in the 1980s from defining lone mothers as the victims of housing shortages to a morally questionable group subverting needs-based allocation policies and the re-emergence of anti-social behaviour as a problem on housing estates). The paper's conclusion is that the 'construction of problems' provides a rich source of new material as well as offering significant opportunities to develop a more critically informed housing research agenda.