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The chapter aims to analyze an innovative intervention in the context of public housing in Italy. Over the past decade, in Italy, neighborhoods with a high concentration of public housing have increasingly become spaces of exclusion, where conflicts are rife, due to a multiplicity of factors (e.g., immigration, social deprivation, ageing, health problems). In particular, because of the global economic crisis and the impoverishment of Italian families, competition and quarrels between lower middle-class natives and migrants have been exacerbated, undermining the recent fragile pattern of social cohesion. However, housing and urban policies are still residual, especially in the political agenda of mid-sized towns, which witness an ungoverned urban growth not always accompanied by a concurrent complete recognition of citizenship. Moreover, policies tackling rising social tension to reduce or prevent it are lacking. Nonetheless, at a local level, some more dynamic municipalities are starting to promote original initiatives also thanks to the sharing of the best national and international practices. In particular we wish to focus on the social mediation processes implemented to prevent conflict and promote sustainable cohabitation, improving relationships between neighbors and fostering empowerment and participation. In this perspective, the chapter explores a two-year project of social mediation for households living in public housing which has been developed in the Marche region.

Based on a case study of the pre-2020 Olympics renewal project in the city-center of Tokyo, this chapter examines the nature and impacts of urban renewal conducted by the Tokyo Metropolitan Government (TMG) in relation to social housing.

A qualitative case study approach is used based on interviews (with different stakeholders), and participant observation (at various local events or public assemblies) to analyze the impact of such urban renewal on social housing and its community.

The TMG has promoted urban renewal of city government-owned land in public-private partnerships by defending these projects as “win-win-win strategy among residents-business-city.” However, at the same time it has worsened the housing conditions of residents by causing their displacement or the deterioration of their housing environment.

The chapter shows us that the TMG’s justification for the urban renewal — would produce trickle-down effects and help the residents — doesn’t reflect what is really happening to the community. This will help us to have a better understanding of the reality and to critically discuss a more just urban and housing policy.

The chapter provides a complex insight on the “super-residualization” of social housing in Japan, characterized not only by the decrease in its number but also urban renewal providing business services and amenities for the middle and upper classes. This provides an interesting comparison with Western societies.

This chapter addresses the related questions of how to assess housing redevelopment and what constitutes a successful redevelopment project, based on the HOPE VI transformation of Boston’s Orchard Park from one of the city’s most notorious, crime-ridden public housing projects into a mixed-income community that remained overwhelmingly composed of low-income residents.

The analysis is based on a unique set of interviews with a sample of residents before and after housing redevelopment occurred. In addition, we draw upon interviews with housing authority staff, official agency file documents, and archival materials.

We find increased residential satisfaction after redevelopment but lingering concerns about safety and security despite marked declines in crime. Although the redevelopment process displaced some households, residents attributed improvements in living conditions to changes in tenant composition prompted by the housing transformation.

The results suggest an alternative model of public housing redevelopment that accommodates a majority of poor, subsidized households with some displacement. Still, loss of housing units, tenant selection, and social problems complicate notions of successful redevelopment.

This chapter contributes to the literature by showing how some low-income families may benefit from housing displacement induced by the redevelopment process. We analyze an overlooked but frequently implemented approach to housing redevelopment under the HOPE VI program to keep the majority of redeveloped units for low-income residents. It is the only study of which we are aware that has collected public housing resident opinions both before and after HOPE VI redevelopment occurred.

The purpose of this chapter is to analyze the evolution in the provision of public services’ delivery, with a specific focus on housing policies. New practices are being implemented, thanks to the cooperation of the public sector, private, and nonprofit actors. Rather than just providing assistance to households with income levels falling below specific thresholds, social housing addresses the broader and more complex areas of vulnerability that affect several categories, such as single parents, young students and professionals, and temporarily unemployed people. Co-production also comes into the picture, since many social housing projects require that beneficiaries contribute to the implementation of the project itself, for example by managing the buildings and common areas or by creating communities.

The chapter will start from considerations on the emergence of new housing needs. It will then review the literature on the concept of co-production of public services and provide a definition of social housing. Then, examples of social housing will be analyzed based on specific criteria derived from the literature and the theoretical framework. The methodology is qualitative and based on descriptive case analysis.

The chapter analyzes the evolution of public housing policies by taking into account the social and economic changes that have determined greater and more complex areas for public intervention, adopting a twofold approach of partnership and collaboration between the three sectors, and of co-production of public services by directly engaging the users.

Based on a case study of conversion of real estate complexes built in Turin at the time of the 2006 Winter Olympic Games into public and subsidized housing, the chapter compares policy goals aimed at producing social mix through the mixing of housing tenure, with actual outcomes and thus identifies possible advantages, challenges, and pitfalls of this kind of intervention.

The analysis is based on a survey and semi-structured interviews with residents, in-depth interviews with key actors, and observation of daily interactions in public and shared places.

Regeneration policies and tenure mix seem to be most effective at preventing neighborhood stigmatization and attract private investments in facility development (area-based effects), but not to be “automatically” a source of mixed social relations and positive role models able to limit socially disapproved behaviors (people-based effects).

The practical lesson which can be drawn from this chapter is that the achievement of people-based effects requires long-standing actions which go beyond the construction and allocation of new apartments.

The chapter engages critically with the idea that built environment has deterministic effects on social environment, and social mix resulted from regeneration and housing policies can work as a catch-all solution for activating and rehabilitating human and social resources in the target area. Specifically, we show how these processes require particular organizational and policy conditions that cannot be taken for granted.

A statutory board is one of the three forms of public enterprise in Singapore which are involved directly or indirectly in economic development. Tan Chwee Huat has defined a statutory board as “an autonomous government agency set up by special legislation to perform specific functions (Tan, 1974, p. 102).” Similarly, Lee Boon Hiok has referred to statutory boards as “a catchall phrase for the statutory bodies which have been established by an Act of Parliament,” which specifies their rationale as well as their rights and powers (Lee, 1975, pp. 38–39).

In this chapter, I focus on stigmatization exercised and experienced by local residents, comparing two socially-diverse areas in very different contexts: the Cabrini Green-Near North area in Chicago and the La Loma-La Florida area in Santiago de Chile.

Data for this study were drawn from 1 year of qualitative research, using interviews with residents and institutional actors, field notes from observation sessions of several inter-group spaces, and “spatial inventories” in which I located the traces of the symbolic presence of each group.

Despite contextual differences of type of social differentiation, type of social mix, type of housing tenure for the poor, and public visibility, I argue that there are important common problems: first, symbolic differences are stressed by identity changes; second, distrust against “the other” is spatially crystallized in any type and scale of social housing; third, stigmatization changes in form and scale; and fourth, there are persisting prejudiced depictions and patterns of avoidance.

Socially-mixed neighborhoods, as areas where at least two different social groups live in proximity, offer an interesting context for observing territorial stigmatization. They are strange creatures of urban development, due to the powerful symbolism of desegregation in contexts of growing inequalities.

The chapter contributes to a cross-national perspective with a comparison of global-north and global-south cities. And it also springs from a study of socially-mixed areas, in which the debate on concentrated/deconcentrated poverty is central, and in which the problem of “clearing places” appears in both material (e.g., displacement) and symbolic (e.g., stigmatization) terms.

The creation of public value is a topical debate for Dutch civil society organizations. Over the years, moving from government to governance, they supposedly have gained responsibility and space in meeting public needs. However, meeting the priority public needs and demonstrating actual public value creation has proved difficult. This has led to many discussions on how and if these organizations are creating public value. This study therefore investigated three practical cases to explore and explain how managers of housing associations create public value.

A case study method was employed.

Based on the different cases we can conclude that despite high ambitions, deviating normative views and the will to change displayed by the managers in the cases we investigated, we did not encounter situations where managers actually managed spaces for the creation of public value. The involved managers are still led by formal agendas and policies, rather than engaging in dialogues with their relevant stakeholders. They remain segmented in their approach and offering of services. Managers’ environment and stakeholders are not yet naturally seen as a place for sharing information and reframing boundaries for creating public value.

The opportunity in the investigated cases and for these managers lies in mobilizing and utilizing network relationships. This article provides a public value praxis model that focuses on involving stakeholders in investigating priority needs, collectively (re)designing services that meet these.