Alan Morris
Biographic Data
| ID | 3613743 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Alan Morris |
| GIVEN NAMES | Alan |
| FAMILY NAME | Morris |
| SIGNATURE | MORRIS A |
| AFFILIATIONS | University of Technology Sydney |
| ORCID | 0000-0001-7652-5370 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 63 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 374 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 63 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 1983 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 11 |
Local Government Adaptation for Dispersed Cald Ageing Communities
Local councils in New South Wales are central to supporting culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) residents, yet many populations are spatially dispersed across local government boundaries. Drawing on interviews with staff across six councils in Greater Sydney and analysis of policy and governance documents, this study examines how place-based systems respond to dispersed older Chinese-speaking communities. We show that while participation…
Assisted Self-Governance
In Australia's multicultural ageing context, older immigrants’ community participation is shaped by institutional arrangements that value inclusion yet struggle to accommodate cultural difference. This article examines how CASS Care Ltd, a long-standing community organisation, supported culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) older adults to become volunteers. Drawing on qualitative analysis of group activities and interviews, the study find…
Lives transformed
Intergenerational Family Relationships and Old‐Age Volunteering
Embedded in the framework of intergenerational solidarity, this paper explores the interactions between older immigrants' participation in volunteering activities and intergenerational family relationships in the Chinese community in Sydney, Australia. The study investigates the effects of volunteering on the lives of older Chinese immigrants. It draws on 57 in‐depth interviews and 6 focus groups with older immigrants, the vast majority of whom w…
Peri-mortem cranial trauma
Differentiated experiences of financial precarity and lived precariousness among international students in Australia
Empirical research on international student migrants has sometimes homogenised this group, framing it as predominantly made up of privileged members of the global middle-class. This has led to calls to acknowledge and address the precarity faced by international students in their respective host countries more comprehensively. This study aims to explore how levels of financial precarity vary among international students in Australia, and how this…
Special Feature
This paper offers a critical analysis of urban displacement and acts as an introduction to the Special Feature: ‘Putting urban displacement in its place’. It begins by noting the magnitude and significance of displacement, and summarises its constituent components. Drawing upon the work of Hirsh, Eizenberg and Jabareen [2020. “A New Conceptual Framework for Understanding Displacement: Bridging the Gaps in Displacement Literature between the Globa…
Reified scarcity & the problem space of ‘need’
Social housing is today a highly residualised sector due to a combination of declining public investment and intensified targeting of stock to the neediest households. We argue that residualisation has opened up a distinct ‘problem space’ wherein policy making and debate are organised around a distinct set of questions and imperatives. Drawing on research into the management of social housing waitlists in Australia, we show how this problem space…
On (not) being literate enough
This paper is focussed on literacy and the literacy experiences of people who are experiencing homelessness or are at risk of homelessness. Drawing on 23 in‐depth interviews with people who have lived experience of homelessness in Sydney, Australia, the paper examines literacy, literacy needs and interest in literacy programmes from a social practice perspective of literacy. Amartya Sen's (1999) capability approach is drawn on to examine the mult…
Precarity Before and During the Pandemic
There is mounting evidence of increased international student financial and work precarity over the last decade in Australia. Yet, there has been a little scholarly analysis of which students are most affected by precarity and its sources. Drawing on two surveys of international students in Australia's two largest cities, conducted before and during the pandemic, we investigate the financial and work vulnerabilities of international students. We …
Crowded house
This article draws on two surveys of international students in Sydney and Melbourne, undertaken in 2019 and during the 2020 COVID-19 lockdowns. Using the concept of bounded agency, we identify how the challenges of living in one of the world’s most expensive rental housing markets impact students’ perceptions of their academic attainment. We find housing insecurity, unaffordability and condition, amplified by financial stress, contribute signific…
International students struggling in the private rental sector in Australia prior to and during the pandemic
International students have emerged as a major cohort within Australia’s post-secondary education sector. Despite contributing substantially to the economy and community, they are expected to make their own way in Australia’s expensive private rental market. Drawing on two surveys—one conducted prior to Covid-19 and one fielded during the pandemic—as well as forty semi-structured in-depth interviews, the article examines strategies adopted by stu…
Dire consequences
Although tens of thousands of households are on the waiting-list for social housing in Australia, little is known about how they experience waiting for social housing. Drawing on 75 interviews conducted with people on the waiting-list (waitees) in three Australian states, we examine the impact of waiting on waitees utilising the concept of triple precarity. Double precarity refers to the insecure employment and housing that a substantial proporti…
International students on the edge
International students are an important global cohort of 'noncitizens' whose experiences are central concerns for urban sociologists and migration scholars. Drawing on survey fieldwork conducted among international students in the private rental sector in Sydney and Melbourne during 2019, this article provides new knowledge about the hardships experienced by international students who report financial stress. Using a modified scale developed by t…
Loneliness within the Home among International Students in the Private Rental Sector in Sydney and Melbourne
We draw on 45 in-depth interviews and a large-scale survey we conducted, to examine loneliness among international students in Sydney and Melbourne within their accommodation. We discuss three features which increase the possibility of loneliness – the physical layout and use of the space; the social composition of fellow tenants, and power differentials between tenants. The interviews indicated that the lack of a congenial common area, having to…
Applying for Social Housing in Australia – The Centrality of Cultural, Social and Emotional Capital
Social housing scarcity has underpinned the development of detailed social housing application processes across Australia. Applications require the strongest possible evidence of disadvantage and need, conceptualized in this paper as the required demonstration of “inverse distinction”. Drawing on 47 in-depth interviews in three Australian states with people who have expert knowledge of the application process, we argue that the onerous requiremen…
Explaining Government Policy Inaction on International Student Housing in Australia
Loneliness and housing tenure
Loneliness is recognised as one the most pressing issues of the contemporary period and, if left untreated, can have serious health implications. We argue that a key determinant of loneliness for older people (65 plus) in Australia dependent on the government Age Pension for their income is their housing tenure. Drawing on semi-structured in-depth interviews, we show that older Australians who are private renters are far more likely than their co…
International Perspectives on Local Government and Housing
This paper examines the role of local government in the provision of housing across advanced economies in the contemporary economy and historically, while seeking to locate the Australian experience in a broader international perspective. The paper finds that ongoing challenges have given rise to policy innovation and new programmatic perspective. These developments have reflected non-systematic, and often disruptive, change rather than the conti…
Global city Sydney
Super-gentrification’ triumphs
This study analyses the super-gentrification of Millers Point, an inner-city area in Sydney, Australia, and the displacement of its 465 public housing tenants. Drawing on in-depth interviews with public housing tenants and homeowners, media reports and government media releases, it argues that a key reason for the displacement was the super-gentrification of the area that was hastened dramatically by the Barangaroo development, a massive urban sp…
Communicide
In 2014, the New South Wales government announced that all of the 465 public housing tenants in Millers Point in inner Sydney, are to be relocated and their homes sold. This article, drawing on 41 semi-structured interviews with tenants who were residents at the time of the announcement, has two main aims. First, to contribute to the debate as to the continuity or otherwise of community in a global city in late modernity by closely examining the …
Private Renting in a Home-owning Society
The rise in private renting in home ownership societies has been variously interpreted as increasing risk and insecurity and providing more flexible housing options for an increasingly diverse resident cohort. Drawing on an original survey and in-depth interviews with private renters in two cities in a classic home ownership society (Australia), there is clear support for the “disaster” interpretation in respect of low-income households renting i…
Housing tenure and the health of older Australians dependent on the age pension for their income
The article examines how the housing tenure of older Australians, who are primarily or solely dependent on the government age pension for their income, impacts on their health. Drawing on 125 in-depth interviews with older private renters, social housing tenants and homeowners, it focuses mainly on interviewees’ narratives as to the impacts of their housing tenure on their mental health and outlook. It illustrates that security of tenure and cost…
Decoding the genetic ancestry of the Swahili
Decoding the genetic ancestry of the Swahili - 1
Stable carbon and nitrogen isotopic analyses of the underclass at the colonial Cape of Good Hope in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries
Analysis of the stable carbon and nitrogen isotope ratios of burials in a colonial cemetery in Cape Town, South Africa, reveals life histories of the underclass there. We are able to distinguish foreign from local-born people, and to infer social status, specifically slavery, by linking bone chemistry and somatic modification. This is the first use of bone chemistry to reconstruct the life histories of a mixed population of diverse origin, buried…
Our fellow Africans make our lives hell
Xenophobia in post-apartheid South Africa has become a major issue. Much of the hostility is directed at Africans from countries north of Southern Africa who are often easily distinguishable due to their physical features, distinctive dress and inability to speak the indigenous languages. This article focuses on immigrants and asylum seekers from two countries, Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Both groupings have experienced signific…
Private Renting in a Home-owning Society
The rise in private renting in home ownership societies has been variously interpreted as increasing risk and insecurity and providing more flexible housing options for an increasingly diverse resident cohort. Drawing on an original survey and in-depth interviews with private renters in two cities in a classic home ownership society (Australia), there is clear support for the “disaster” interpretation in respect of low-income households renting i…
Diagenesis of bone from Border Cave
Living on the Margins
An increasing number of older Australians are dependent on the private rental market for their accommodation. Through the use of semi-structured in-depth interviews, the life circumstances of older renters (65 plus) in both public housing and private rented accommodation in Sydney are explored and compared. Using Amartya Sen's concepts of capabilities and functionings, the study illustrates that due mainly to lower accommodation costs and greater…
Finding community and contesting heteronormativity
This study examines how queer young people in Australia are engaging in an online community to address their marginalisation and oppression. Drawing on an analysis of online forums and in-depth interviews with 14 participants, we use Durkheim's concept of egoism and the social model of disability to analyse the role and impact of the online community. The findings indicate that the community not only provides a sense of belonging for the particip…
The Desegregation of Hillbrow, Johannesburg, 1978-82
A cornerstone of apartheid was the enforcement of urban residential segregation. From the mid 1970s, however, the racial composition of the Johannesburg inner city, historically a white group area, altered dramatically. The paper illustrates that the national context in the 1970s made it increasingly difficult for the state to carry out its urban apartheid policy. The economic crisis increased the state housing shortage in the respective black gr…
Backyard Soweto
Backyard accommodation is widespread in South African cities; a phenomenon that is rare in most other parts of the world. Such a 'solution' is an outcome of past and present policies and this article demonstrates that over the years there have been certain similarities in government policy between Chile and South Africa, the only other country with significant numbers of families living in backyard accommodation. However, Sowetan backyard dweller…
Interpreting the rise of long-term private renting in a liberal welfare regime context
In liberal market Anglophone nations, where private rental housing is typically lightly regulated, little is known about the household-level drivers of recent private rental sector growth. In Australia, where long-term private renting (10 years plus) has doubled since the 1990s, growing numbers are thus exposed to risks of landlord-initiated moves and unpredictable rent rises for lengthy periods. Our research suggests that although long-term rent…
Second wave gentrification in inner-city Sydney
Long-term private renters
Many developed economies, especially in 'liberal welfare regimes', have experienced a substantial growth in private rental housing. Bound up with this dynamic is the rising incidence of long-term private renting (private renting for ten years or more). Regulation of the private rental sector in liberal welfare regimes is light and post the written agreement residents are subject to constant de jure insecurity. Drawing on a questionnaire survey an…
Special Feature
This paper offers a critical analysis of urban displacement and acts as an introduction to the Special Feature: ‘Putting urban displacement in its place’. It begins by noting the magnitude and significance of displacement, and summarises its constituent components. Drawing upon the work of Hirsh, Eizenberg and Jabareen [2020. “A New Conceptual Framework for Understanding Displacement: Bridging the Gaps in Displacement Literature between the Globa…
Housing tenure and the health of older Australians dependent on the age pension for their income
The article examines how the housing tenure of older Australians, who are primarily or solely dependent on the government age pension for their income, impacts on their health. Drawing on 125 in-depth interviews with older private renters, social housing tenants and homeowners, it focuses mainly on interviewees’ narratives as to the impacts of their housing tenure on their mental health and outlook. It illustrates that security of tenure and cost…
Race Relations and Racism in a Racially Diverse Inner City Neighbourhood
Hillbrow, a high-rise, inner city suburb in Johannesburg was one of the first neighbourhoods to become racially diverse in spite of the Group Areas Act of 1950. From the late 1970s, its whites-only policy started crumbling and by 1993 when the data for this study were collected, under 20 per cent of its population was white. The central questions that are addressed in this paper are: how did racial propinquity impact on race relations and interra…
Questioning the Need for Social Mix
A common argument is that ‘social mix’—or a high ratio of homeowners and private renters to social housing tenants within the same neighbourhood—reduces disadvantage by eroding homogeneous ‘bonded’ social networks amongst the latter. However, associations between network homogeneity and support in social housing have not been analysed using national survey data. This article examines age, ethnic and educational homogeneity/heterogeneity and infor…
Tenant-Landlord Relations, the Anti-apartheid Struggle and Physical Decline in Hillbrow, an Inner-city Neighbourhood in Johannesburg
This paper examines the role of tenant-landlord relations in the physical decline of apartment blocks in an inner-city neighbourhood in Johannesburg that had undergone a racial transition during the height of the anti- apartheid struggle. It is argued that apartment blocks owned in their entirety by small landlords were most likely to be characterised by inadequate maintenance, decline and tenant resistance. Tenant resistance, however, rather tha…
Super-gentrification’ triumphs
This study analyses the super-gentrification of Millers Point, an inner-city area in Sydney, Australia, and the displacement of its 465 public housing tenants. Drawing on in-depth interviews with public housing tenants and homeowners, media reports and government media releases, it argues that a key reason for the displacement was the super-gentrification of the area that was hastened dramatically by the Barangaroo development, a massive urban sp…
It was like leaving your family”
In March 2014, the minister responsible announced that all of the approximately 600 public housing tenants of Millers Point and the Sirius Building in inner Sydney are to be moved and the properties sold. Millers Point is probably the oldest public housing area in Australia. The Sirius Building was purpose built for public housing tenants in the late 1970s. The article briefly examines the gentrification process in the Millers Point area. However…
A new form of energy poverty is the hallmark of liberalised electricity sectors
The restructuring of electricity sectors has resulted in households paying significantly higher prices. Some European prices rose by more than 100 per cent between 2000 and 2010. NSW households experienced an 80 per cent increase during the period 2007 to 2012. Growing numbers of low‐income and vulnerable households are spending higher proportions of disposable income on energy bills and, we contend, suffer deprivation and social exclusion as a r…
Communicide
In 2014, the New South Wales government announced that all of the 465 public housing tenants in Millers Point in inner Sydney, are to be relocated and their homes sold. This article, drawing on 41 semi-structured interviews with tenants who were residents at the time of the announcement, has two main aims. First, to contribute to the debate as to the continuity or otherwise of community in a global city in late modernity by closely examining the …
The residualisation of public housing and its impact on older tenants in inner-city Sydney, Australia
Since the early 1990s public housing in Australia has become increasingly residualised. The high demand and limited availability means that in order to be eligible potential tenants usually have to be in 'greatest need'. This article has three main sections. It first considers the processes which have led to the residualisation of public housing. Second, through the use of in-depth interviews the way older public housing tenants in inner-city nei…
A Qualitative Examination of Jim Kemeny’s Arguments on High Home Ownership, the Retirement Pension and the Dualist Rental System Focusing on Australia
A key aspect of Jim Kemeny’s argument is that in advanced economies that have high levels of home ownership, the age pension is only adequate if you have low accommodation costs. A related argument is that these societies will be dominated by what he calls a dualist rental market. In this rental market regulation is minimal and landlords hold sway. Kemeny’s thesis, was given added support by Castles’ (1998) more extensive comparative analysis. He…
The Trajectory towards Marginality
For older Australians being dependent on the private rental market is usually associated with serious financial hardship and insecurity. The article examines the housing careers of older Australians who are dependent on the private rental market. After sketching the policy context, it uses in-depth interviews and a biographical approach to explore their trajectory into the private rental market. Divorce, separation and widowhood were key factors,…
Marginality amidst plenty
In this paper, drawing on in‐depth interviews, we illustrate that despite the significant overall increase in the wealth of older Australians over the last two decades, a sizeable proportion of older Australians (65 and over) are in a vulnerable accommodation situation and many face the possibility of finding themselves homeless. This is especially so for those older Australians who are dependent on government for their income and are living in p…
Race and Iron age human skeletal remains from Southern Africa
INTRODUCTION: Pregnancy is a crucial period which ultimately directly impacts two individuals health and wellbeing. Within the UK, a standardised pattern of care is established with collaborations across disciplines to the benefit of women and babies. During the COVID19 pandemic, this pattern of care was disrupted to align with protective protocols which until now, has not been formally reported. METHODS: A retrospective, mixed methods study of U…
Race and Iron age human skeletal remains from Southern Africa
INTRODUCTION: Pregnancy is a crucial period which ultimately directly impacts two individuals health and wellbeing. Within the UK, a standardised pattern of care is established with collaborations across disciplines to the benefit of women and babies. During the COVID19 pandemic, this pattern of care was disrupted to align with protective protocols which until now, has not been formally reported. METHODS: A retrospective, mixed methods study of U…
Man, the Tottering Biped
The Origins of Mankind
Trading estate
The Wadi Kubbaniya Skeleton
Racism and space
The Desegregation of Hillbrow, Johannesburg, 1978-82
A cornerstone of apartheid was the enforcement of urban residential segregation. From the mid 1970s, however, the racial composition of the Johannesburg inner city, historically a white group area, altered dramatically. The paper illustrates that the national context in the 1970s made it increasingly difficult for the state to carry out its urban apartheid policy. The economic crisis increased the state housing shortage in the respective black gr…
Diagenesis of bone from Border Cave
Physical decline in an inner-city neighbourhood
Fighting against the tide
1998). Fighting against the tide: the white right and desegregation in Johannesburg's inner city. African Studies: Vol. 57, No. 1, pp. 55-78
Our fellow Africans make our lives hell
Xenophobia in post-apartheid South Africa has become a major issue. Much of the hostility is directed at Africans from countries north of Southern Africa who are often easily distinguishable due to their physical features, distinctive dress and inability to speak the indigenous languages. This article focuses on immigrants and asylum seekers from two countries, Nigeria and the Democratic Republic of Congo. Both groupings have experienced signific…
European Memories of the Second World War
Tenant-Landlord Relations, the Anti-apartheid Struggle and Physical Decline in Hillbrow, an Inner-city Neighbourhood in Johannesburg
This paper examines the role of tenant-landlord relations in the physical decline of apartment blocks in an inner-city neighbourhood in Johannesburg that had undergone a racial transition during the height of the anti- apartheid struggle. It is argued that apartment blocks owned in their entirety by small landlords were most likely to be characterised by inadequate maintenance, decline and tenant resistance. Tenant resistance, however, rather tha…
Race Relations and Racism in a Racially Diverse Inner City Neighbourhood
Hillbrow, a high-rise, inner city suburb in Johannesburg was one of the first neighbourhoods to become racially diverse in spite of the Group Areas Act of 1950. From the late 1970s, its whites-only policy started crumbling and by 1993 when the data for this study were collected, under 20 per cent of its population was white. The central questions that are addressed in this paper are: how did racial propinquity impact on race relations and interra…
Backyard Soweto
Backyard accommodation is widespread in South African cities; a phenomenon that is rare in most other parts of the world. Such a 'solution' is an outcome of past and present policies and this article demonstrates that over the years there have been certain similarities in government policy between Chile and South Africa, the only other country with significant numbers of families living in backyard accommodation. However, Sowetan backyard dweller…
Stable carbon and nitrogen isotopic analyses of the underclass at the colonial Cape of Good Hope in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries
Analysis of the stable carbon and nitrogen isotope ratios of burials in a colonial cemetery in Cape Town, South Africa, reveals life histories of the underclass there. We are able to distinguish foreign from local-born people, and to infer social status, specifically slavery, by linking bone chemistry and somatic modification. This is the first use of bone chemistry to reconstruct the life histories of a mixed population of diverse origin, buried…
Progress and setbacks for local government
A Decade of Post-Apartheid
This paper argues that in many ways the South African city continues to reflect the apartheid spatial and socio-economic order. Most black South Africans, especially that section of the population that was categorized African during the apartheid era (about four in five South Africans), remain marginalized, while white South Africans, although increasingly differentiated, continue to dominate spatially and economically. There has certainly been p…
Older marginalised people
This study 1 explores the situation of marginally housed older people in NSW, Victoria and SA. It investigates pathways into homelessness and the importance of interventions and support to ensure that older, vulnerable people retain their accommodation. The research is based on 59 in-depth interviews with older people who were all clients of the Assistance with Care and Housing for the Aged (ACHA) program; a national survey of 46 ACHA agencies; a…
Marginality amidst plenty
In this paper, drawing on in‐depth interviews, we illustrate that despite the significant overall increase in the wealth of older Australians over the last two decades, a sizeable proportion of older Australians (65 and over) are in a vulnerable accommodation situation and many face the possibility of finding themselves homeless. This is especially so for those older Australians who are dependent on government for their income and are living in p…
Living on the margins
In this study I explore the world of older private renters in Sydney. I illustrate that for those older renters who are forced to live in unsubsidised privately rented dwellings, everyday life is extremely difficult and government policy in regards to providing affordable housing is seriously flawed. For most older private renters, financial stress is enormous and the most basic items are difficult to acquire. The level of hardship was determined…
Second wave gentrification in inner-city Sydney
On the Edge
In this study, based mainly on 17 in‐depth interviews, I explore the financial implications of being an older private renter in Sydney. I illustrate that there are three key factors which determine their degree of financial stress – the actual rent being paid; the degree of support from family members and whether the older renter is living in a single or couple household. It is shown that several of the older renters interviewed found it hard to …
Living on the Margins
An increasing number of older Australians are dependent on the private rental market for their accommodation. Through the use of semi-structured in-depth interviews, the life circumstances of older renters (65 plus) in both public housing and private rented accommodation in Sydney are explored and compared. Using Amartya Sen's concepts of capabilities and functionings, the study illustrates that due mainly to lower accommodation costs and greater…
Contentment and Suffering
Housing policy in Australia historically has focused on facilitating homeownership and creating some buffer for those households that are not homeowners. This paper explores the implications of this policy for older Australians. What is argued is that housing tenure has become a crucial divide and that older Australians who have not had the good fortune to access homeownership or public / community housing and who are dependent on the private ren…
Political science (42 works) · Sociology (38 works) · Economics (32 works) · Housing, Finance, and Neoliberalism (27 works) · Economic growth (25 works) · Law (23 works) · Geography (21 works) · Business (19 works) · Psychology (19 works) · Law (17 works)