A number of people looking to get their heads around the housing crisis have been reaching out to me for a primer on housing policy. There are really great articles on housing and the built environment these days - Franco Faraudo, Konrad Putzier, Ezra Klein are all helping to explain this incredibly complex story. Still, if you want to dig a bit further, here’s a shelf of my library:

I always recommend starting with Gerry Frug. He opens our minds to ways of community building. Community building happens at a city level; it also happens within an organization, in an office, in a neighborhood, in any place we might find community. He cautions us against seeing city services as a drop down menu:

“The divisive effect of [shopping for city services] is not limited to the fact that it generates inequality, although that itself is important. It also promotes a consumer-oriented understanding of city services and, as a result, undermines the public nature of public services.”

After Frug, maybe Power/Knowledge? I love how Foucault describes what our built environment has come to be:

“Previously, the art of building corresponded to the need to make power, divinity and might manifest. The palace and the church were the great architectural forms, along with the stronghold…it becomes a question of using the disposition of space for economico-political ends.”

Housing is an opportunity for community building. The “solution” is not just fixing zoning or simply another tax credit - it requires expanding our understanding of housing’s role. Housing is an essential good, and it is so much more than that! It’s what groceries we buy, whether we breath easily or develop asthma, where we go to school, the community we come to know.…