Essai

Housing Commons

Alternatives to Housing Through Urban Commoning

Zacharias ValiantzasPaschalis Arvanitidis

The paper builds upon the concepts of the right to the city and urban commoning, to advance the theory of housing commons. Moreover, it draws on selected initiatives to highlight commonalities and differences, and to portray the diversity of contemporary housing commons. We articulate the framework of urban commoning that urban commoners proclaim through Lefebvre’s (1968) right to the city, i.e., urban dwellers’ collective right and power over urban qualities and the urbanization processes. This has been embraced by the new social urban movements to deploy a range of...