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ABSTRACT
This article brings together feminist and critical theoretical perspectives on vulnerability to critique normative framing of vulnerability in housing. Vulnerability is often positioned as the problem affordable housing policies and programmes are designed to address). Feminist conceptions of vulnerability, by contrast, consider vulnerability as a universal condition. From a feminist perspective, I explicate the ways in which the Canadian housing regime constructs precarity in three ways: a reliance on precarious employment, positioning vulnerability as an inherent characteristic of populations, and finally through an imagined separation between nonmarket housing and (transnational) market practices. I suggest feminist conceptions of vulnerability offer a potent way forward to rethink the housing system. This recognition of shared vulnerability that is differentially felt might turn us away from targeted and population-specific interventions and instead direct attention to the housing regime itself.
Disclosure Statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1. This research was reviewed by the Athabasca University Research Ethics Board, #24483.
2. Previously I have used the term “frontline” here but was struck by the critique offered by one of Dej’s (2020) respondents that “frontline” linked to battle and that this indicates a combative relationship. I continue to use frontline in this paper when referring to language used in the work I am discussing.
3. Following Ahmed (Citation2002), I used racialized here to signal the ways in which bodies are seen to “have” a racial identity.
4. I use the term “houseless” rather than “homeless” following the Indigenous definition of homelessness and critiques from people with lived experience that while there may not be a roof over their head, this does not mean that they do not have a home.