As the housing affordability crisis in Australia deepens, policy-makers have expended considerable resources in establishing new regulatory practices to enhance the role of the community housing sector. Ostensibly, the rationale for a new tier of regulation is to assure potential institutional investors (e.g. pension funds, investment trusts and banks) that community housing organisations are accountable and safe places to invest. Our paper adopts an alternative reading of diversity and housing regulation, drawing upon the governmentality thesis advanced by Michel Foucault in an empirical study about the early stages of regulation of affordable housing providers. Amongst our claims are: first, that policies to diversify and regulate the housing sector constitute a radical political project to commercialise welfare provision and second, these policies are likely to generate additional bureaucratic burdens and close off possibilities for progressive reform. The paper also considers the value of the governmentality approach for critical investigations in the field of housing.

Item Type:	Refereed Article
Keywords:	Australia; housing policy; regulation; governmentality; Foucault
Research Division:	Studies in Human Society
Research Group:	Sociology
Research Field:	Urban Sociology and Community Studies
Objective Division:	Law, Politics and Community Services
Objective Group:	Government and Politics
Objective Field:	Public Services Policy Advice and Analysis
Author:	Jacobs, KA (Professor Keith Jacobs)
Author:	Travers, MH (Dr Max Travers)
ID Code:	101445
Year Published:	2015
Web of Science® Times Cited:	1
Deposited By:	Social Sciences
Deposited On:	2015-06-24
Last Modified:	2017-11-27
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