Ethically-speaking, what is the most reasonable way of evaluating housing outcomes

Bibliographic Data

ID12633846
AuthorsChris Foye (0000-0001-7880-2714, University of Glasgow, corresponding author)
Year2020
Volume38
Issue1
Pages115-131
Publication date2020-01-09
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueHousing Theory and Society (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1403-6096 • E-ISSN: 1651-2278
PublisherTaylor & Francis (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/14036096.2019.1697356
OpenAlexW2999579955
LanguageEN
Citations received16
References cited51

This paper addresses one of the most fundamental, but least considered, questions in housing research: how should we ultimately evaluate housing outcomes? Rejecting the fact vs value dichotomy so dominant in the social sciences, this paper draws on the work of Amartya Sen and Hilary Putnam to critically assess the ethical assumptions behind three commonly adopted “informational spaces” for evaluating housing outcomes: economic, subjective and “objective” metrics. It argues that all three fail to account for the plurality of goods that individuals have reason to value and the fallibility of human judgement. As an alternative, it proposes that housing outcomes should be ultimately evaluated in terms of people’s “housing capabilities” - the effective freedoms that people have in their homes and neighbourhoods to do and feel the things they have reason to value – which should generally be determined through a bottom-up process of democratic deliberation involving critical and expert perspectives

Deliberation · Democracy · Economic growth · Economics · Judgement · Law and economics · Political science · Politics · Positive economics · Public housing · Sociology · Value (mathematics · Computer Science · Housing, Finance, and Neoliberalism · Income, Poverty, and Inequality · Law

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