Human rights and housing unaffordability: Applying policy practice engagement to a wicked problem
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.11157/anzswj-vol33iss4id911Keywords:
Housing unaffordability, policy practice engagement, Universal Declaration of Human RightsAbstract
INTRODUCTION: In working with marginalised communities, social workers are confronted with the consequences of housing unaffordability. The 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), adopted by Aotearoa New Zealand, identifies housing deprivation as a human right of relevance to social work. This study explores the application of the Policy Practice Engagement (PPE) framework (Gal & Weiss-Gal, 2015) as a tool by which social workers can contribute to policy-making processes to address the human right to affordable housing.
METHOD: The project used a descriptive/exploratory design. Data were collected by semi- structured interviews of eight subject matter experts in housing affordability: two public sector economists; one private sector economist/developer; two public sector urban planners; one public policy advisor; one non-governmental policy analyst; and one private sector housing strategist. Data were analysed thematically, followed by an inter-rater process.
FINDINGS: Participants identified human rights as relevant to the wicked problem (Grint, 2005) of housing affordability. Participants also identified political, economic and environmental factors impacting affordable housing. They considered that these factors are found in local body planning regulations, leading to land supply constraints. Some participants considered that housing unaffordability is the price paid to live in liveable cities.
CONCLUSIONS: The PPE framework offers a conceptual structure through which social workers can address housing unaffordability. By understanding the factors causing unaffordability, social workers are enabled to examine why and how they should contribute to policy processes.
References
Adamson, C. (2014). A social work lens for a disaster- informed curriculum. Advances in Social Work & Welfare Education, 16(2), 7–22.
Amore, K. (2019). Everyone counts: Defining and measuring severe housing deprivation (homelessness) [Unpublished doctoral dissertation]. University of Otago.
Aotearoa New Zealand Association of Social Workers. (2019). Code of Ethics (Rev. ed.). https://www.anzasw. nz/code-of-ethics/
Argyris, C., & Schön, D. A. (1996): Organizational learning II: Theory, method and practice Addison-Wesley.
Armstrong, D., Gosling, A., Weinman, J., & Marteau, T. (1997). The place of inter-rater reliability in qualitative research: An empirical study. Sociology, 31(3), 597–606.
Asher, I., & St. John, S. (2016). Child poverty and health in New Zealand. The Policy Observatory. https://thepolicyobservatory.aut.ac.nz/__data/assets/pdf_file/0005/75092/Asher-and-St-John-Child-Poverty- Health-in-NZ-v3.pdf
Auerbach, G. (2012). Urban planning: Politics vs. Planning and Politicians vs. Planners. Horizons in Geography, 79/80, 49–69.
Bazeley, P., & Jackson, K. (2013). Qualitative data analysis with NVivo (2nd ed.). Sage.
Crotty, M. (1998). The foundations of social research: Meaning and perspective in the research process. Sage.
Dominelli, L. (2012). Green social work: Polity.
Eremia, M., Toma, L., & Sanduleac, M. (2017). The Smart City Concept in the 21st Century. Procedia Engineering, 181, 12–19. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.proeng.2017.02.357
Gal, J., & Weiss-Gal, I. (2015). The “why” and the “how” of policy practice: An eight-country comparison. British Journal of Social Work, 45(4), 1083–1101. https://doi.10.1093/bjsw/bct179
Grint, K. (2005). Problems, problems, problems: The social construction of “leadership.” Human Relations, 58(11), 1467–1494. https://doi.10.1177/0018726705061314
Guba, E. G., & Lincoln, Y. S. (2005). Paradigmatic controversies, contradictions, and emerging confluences. In N. K. Denzin & Y. S. Lincoln (Eds.), The SAGE handbook of qualitative research (3rd ed., pp. 191–215). Sage.
Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health. (2021). Harvard Transdisciplinary Research in Energetics and Cancer Center: Definitions. https://www.hsph.harvard.edu/trec/ about-us/definitions
Hipkins, C. (2018, October 2), PPTA conference speech [Press release]. https://www.beehive.govt.nz/speech/ ppta-conference-speech
Human Rights Commission Te Ka ̄hu Tika Tangata. (2017). The human right to adequate housing in New Zealand: Human Rights Commission. https://www.hrc.co.nz/files/4215/1363/5639/2017_07_25_-_Right_to_housing_ flyer_-_updated.pdf
Hunt, P. (2021, August 2). Human Rights Commission launches national inquiry into housing crisis. C. Dann (Ed.). Morning Report RNZ. https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/448245/human-rights-commission-launches- national-inquiry-into-housing-crisis
International Federation of Social Workers. (2014). Global definition of social work. http://ifsw.org/policies/definition- of-social-work/
One News. (2020). “More than a crisis” – Emergency housing group calls for urgent Government action as demand soars. https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=m_VL--JtCTo&t=209s
Howden-Chapman, P., & Eaqub, S. (2018). A stocktake of New Zealand’s housing. Ministry of Business, Innovation & Employment.
Kemp, S. P., Palinkas, L. A., & Mason, L. R. (2018). Create social responses to a changing environment. In R. Fong, J. Lubben, & R. P. Barth (Eds.), Grand challenges for social work and society. Oxford Scholarship Online.
Marlowe, J. (2018) Belonging and transnational refugee settlement: Unsettling the everyday and the extraordinary. Routledge.
Ministry for the Environment. (2018). National Policy Statement on Urban Development Capacity: Summary evaluation report of Housing and Business Development Capacity Assessments for high-growth urban areas. Wellington: Author.
Ministry for the Environment & Local Government Association. (1993). Making connections: An overview of Agenda 21. Wellington: Author.
Ministry for the Environment and Ministry of Business Innovation and Employment. (2016). Recommendations and decisions report on the Policy Statement on Urban Development Capacity. Wellington: Author.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade. (n.d.). Sustainable development goals. https://www.mfat.govt.nz/en/peace- rights-and-security/work-with-the-un-and-other-partners/ new-zealand-and-the-sustainable-development-goals-sdgs/
Parker C. (2015). Housing supply, choice and affordability: Trends, economic drivers, and possible policy interventions. Auckland City Council.
Parker, D. (2018, March 28). Economic growth within environmental limits. [Address to the Resource Management Law Association Seminar]. https://www.beehive.govt.nz/speech/economic-growth- within-environmental-limits
Rittel, H., & Webber, M. (1973). Dilemmas in a general theory of planning. Policy Sciences, 4(2), 155–169. https://10.1007/bf01405730
Sandhusen, R. L. (2008). Marketing (4th ed.). Barron’s Business Review Series, Simon & Schuster.
Schein, E. H., & Schein, P. (2016). The structure of culture. In Organizational culture and leadership (5th ed., pp. 17–30). John Wiley.
Simmons, B. M. (2012). Evidence-based practice, person-in- environment, and clinical social work: Issues of practical concern. Smith College Studies in Social Work, 82(1), 3–18. https://doi.10.1080/00377317.2011.638889
Statistics New Zealand/Tatauranga Aotearoa. (2021). Household economic statistics (Expenditure). http://datainfoplus.stats.govt.nz/Item/nz.govt. stats/1bff2593-6872-4995-b71a-506b4612902c?&_ ga=2.131977095.940982178.1629849152- 1893885349.1629849152#/nz.govt.stats/1bff2593-6872- 4995-b71a-506b4612902c/107
Tay, L., & Diener, E. (2011). Needs and subjective well-being around the world. Journal of Personality & Social Psychology, 101(2), 354–365.
The Treasury. (2017). Briefing for the incoming Minister of Finance: The Treasury. https://www.treasury.govt.nz/ sites/default/files/2017-12/bim-tsy-finance-oct17.pdf
Twyford, P. (2019, December 7). Speech to Government Economics Network 2019 Conference. https://www.beehive.govt.nz/speech/speech-government-economics-network-2019-conference
United Nations General Assembly. (1949). Universal declaration of human rights: Final authorised text. United Nations Department of Public Information.
Weaver, R. (1984). Ideas have consequences. University of Chicago Press.
Woolley L. (2014). Housing support services for families/ whānau and individuals who have experienced homelessness: A case study of VisionWest Community Trust, West Auckland [Unpublished master’s thesis]. UNITEC, Auckland.
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:
By completing the online submission process, you confirm you accept this agreement. The following is the entire agreement between you and the Aotearoa New Zealand Association of Social Workers (ANZASW) and it may be modified only in writing.
You and any co-authors
If you are completing this agreement on behalf of co-authors, you confirm that you are acting on their behalf with their knowledge.
First publication
By submitting the work you are:
- granting the ANZASW the right of first publication of this work;
- confirming that the work is original; and
- confirming that the work has not been published in any other form.
Once published, you are free to use the final, accepted version in any way, as outlined below under Copyright.
Copyright
You assign copyright in the final, accepted version of your article to the ANZASW. You and any co-authors of the article retain the right to be identified as authors of the work.
The ANZASW will publish the final, accepted manuscript under a Creative Commons Attribution licence (CC BY 4.0). This licence allows anyone – including you – to share, copy, distribute, transmit, adapt and make commercial use of the work without needing additional permission, provided appropriate attribution is made to the original author or source.
A human-readable summary of the licence is available from http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0, which includes a link to the full licence text.
Under this licence you can use the final, published version of the article freely – such as depositing a copy in your institutional research repository, uploading a copy to your profile on an academic networking site or including it in a different publication, such as a collection of articles on a topic or in conference proceedings – provided that original publication in Aotearoa New Zealand Social Work is acknowledged.
This agreement has no effect on any pre-publication versions or elements, which remain entirely yours, and to which we claim no right.
Reviewers hold copyright in their own comments and should not be further copied in any way without their permission.
The copyright of others
If your article includes the copyright material of others (e.g. graphs, diagrams etc.), you confirm that your use either:
- falls within the limits of fair dealing for the purposes of criticism and review or fair use; OR
- that you have gained permission from the rights holder for publication in an open access journal.
