{"id":14917,"date":"2020-07-08T09:00:01","date_gmt":"2020-07-08T13:00:01","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/?p=14917"},"modified":"2020-07-01T13:25:52","modified_gmt":"2020-07-01T17:25:52","slug":"homelessness-and-the-international-response-to-coronavirus","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/homelessness-and-the-international-response-to-coronavirus\/","title":{"rendered":"Homelessness and the International Response to Coronavirus"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Interview with Leilani Farha, Former United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Global Right to Housing<\/h2>\n

Leilani Farha wrapped up a six-year tenure as the United Nations\u2019 Special Rapporteur on the International Right to Housing at the end of May 2020. By that time, Farha had already left an indelible mark on the world community.<\/p>\n

A prolific character in poverty prevention, Farha is an activist change-maker. As one journey ended and her new role as Global Director of \u201cThe Shift\u201d began, Leilani somehow found time to reflect on her path.<\/p>\n

\u201cHousing is understood globally, as a human right. What that means is that it should be a place where you can live in peace with security and dignity,\u201d she said. She added, \u201calthough that\u2019s a pretty simple concept, billions of people around the world do not enjoy that right.\u201d<\/p>\n

Delving deeper into her responsibilities, Farha explained that her role with the United Nations included many forms of research.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d travel to different countries, spending weeks investigating. I’d go into people\u2019s homes and neighborhoods, meeting with experts, government officials, lawyers, judges, etc. Then I\u2019d kind of do a reckoning, exploring what\u2019s good and bad, and what can be improved. I would release formal recommendations. More often than not, it was local organizations that would take those recommendations and really run with them.\u201d<\/p>\n

This scenario isn’t uncommon in social policy research and development. Often, it ends up being front-line organizations being tasked with tackling the elephant in the room.<\/h4>\n

To her credit, Leilani offered sympathetic respects to local governments who she viewed as \u201callies” in affecting change for society\u2019s underserved.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn the role, I did a lot of community visits. I\u2019ve been up and down California, looking at tent encampments. Some of the worst homelessness in the world is taking place in California, which is the richest state in the U.S.\u201d<\/p>\n

Throughout that experience, and wherever it seemed to take her, she highlighted one important takeaway: all issues were still local issues somewhere.<\/p>\n

\u201cOne thing that\u2019s certain is that poverty finds itself everywhere.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI think that local councils have an important role to play in challenging poverty, but they often don\u2019t have resources. Every socio-economic problem is on the doorstep of a city. They\u2019re the ones hearing what people are telling them about their daily realities.\u201d<\/p>\n

Her impassioned argument for empathy continued, catapulting into some perplexing questions.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhy is it that just one month into the COVID-19 pandemic, so many people began struggling to pay rents? It suggests that many people don\u2019t have savings. But is that because everyone\u2019s a spend thrift, going out and spending wildly? Of course not! So, then you have to think \u2018what\u2019s going on?\u2019\u201d<\/em><\/h4>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s going on is the cost of rent,\u201d Farha continued.<\/p>\n

\u201cRent is skyrocketing,\u201d she noted, simultaneously pointing out how many national programs \u201care not enlightened enough to know what that local reality is.\u201d<\/p>\n

In spite of aforementioned advantages that municipal partnerships can bring, she didn\u2019t speak fondly of the audacious challenges that city governments can cause.<\/p>\n

\u201cCities do all sorts of things that I don\u2019t agree with,\u201d she said, citing examples of municipalities ticketing homeless people for violating stay at home rules at the onset of the pandemic. \u201cHomeless people don\u2019t have a home! And ticketing homeless people? You can\u2019t ticket people who don\u2019t have any money and expect them to pay. It\u2019s obscene!\u201d she proclaimed damningly.<\/p>\n

\u201cCities do many things that I have always felt were questionable. But I\u2019ve always felt for cities. So much is downloaded to them to manage. They often don\u2019t have the capacities to do what\u2019s necessary.\u201d<\/p>\n

While on the topic of pandemic-specific policy, Leilani’s comments were cautionary.<\/p>\n

\u201cEverything seems to have unwound with the pandemic being the focus. Although there are many measures being put in place to create genuine safety nets for people who struggle as this pandemic unfolds, I\u2019m concerned what happens after the worst of the pandemic is over and disease begins to subside. I think we\u2019ll find that the pandemic will not be over for people living in low incomes and poverty.\u201d<\/p>\n

Social Welfare Modernization<\/h3>\n

\u201cIf countries go under and enact austerity measures, it often ends up that those plans are managed on backs of low-income people. That\u2019s when you start seeing welfare entitlements and investments in education decline. We know that investments in health are the least likely to decline, because this pandemic is forcing the hand of government in that respect.\u201d<\/p>\n

When asked how she\u2019d respond to western governments\u2019 pandemic response measures, her optimism was muted by the incumbent reality. Once the disaster has been managed, the response to it will end.<\/p>\n

\u201cI hear people saying \u2018it\u2019s amazing what governments are doing now. Look at how active they are.\u2019 And I think that might be true. But I think that might disappear quickly post-pandemic.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve heard politicians saying \u2018what we are doing now is not about structural change. What we are doing now is about addressing emergencies.\u2019 They\u2019re very clear that we are not implementing universal basic income. We\u2019re implementing an emergency fund for people who are unemployed, who lost their jobs as a result of the pandemic. They don\u2019t want to go down that structural path,\u201d which she determined \u201cis a lost opportunity.\u201d<\/p>\n

On the topic of basic income and the growing movement to support its implementation, Leilani\u2019s comments were again cautiously optimistic.<\/h4>\n

\u201cI have mixed feelings,\u201d she said.
\n\u201cI don\u2019t have any sort of theoretical or ideological problem with it. What I consider though, is that we do have an existing welfare system intact. One that\u2019s completely fraught.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat happens when you dismantle the current welfare system and put in a basic income system? What are the advantages when weighed against the disadvantages? And at the end of the day, we might all agree that the welfare system sucks, so let\u2019s get rid of it. And in fact, maybe a new system administered through federal taxes like a basic income would be better.\u201d<\/p>\n

Switching gears to another international focus at the centre of her advocacy, Leilani broke down the explosive growth in housing being exploited for financial liquidity.<\/h4>\n

\u201cThe \u2018financialization of housing\u2019 is when housing is used as a commodity, rather than something of social value. We\u2019re finding around the world that housing is being used as a way to hide wealth. There\u2019s a lot of dirty money in housing being used to leverage more capital,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

As the primary subject of the acclaimed documentary \u201cPush”, Leilani has been largely credited with propelling this topic to the international stage. The acclaim the film received only speaks further to the mounting disaster.<\/p>\n

\u201cI go around the world and investigate the phenomena, from South Korea to Chile, to Canada, and beyond. In the film, I end up starting a global movement called \u2018The Shift,\u2019 which is a gathering from all of the world of global stakeholders, all wanting to see housing secured as a human right.\u201d<\/p>\n

She remarked that the 2008 global financial crisis “was really a global housing pandemic.\u201d It spurred a systematic financial deconstruction of what homeownership means, pointing to the sales of bad debts to multi-national companies who turn foreclosures into rental properties. She said that \u201cthey then rent them back to many who have lost homes. The rents were jacked up, and the model exploded.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThis same model has been adopted by multinational corporations in cities internationally, allowing for housing to become a significant financial commodity, which can be exploited, often further thrusting people into poverty.\u201d<\/p>\n

Returning to the topic of pandemic response, Leilani offered a compassionate plea for significant social reforms.<\/h4>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s unacceptable that we have hundreds of thousands (or millions) of people living in homelessness. Before the pandemic, we boasted about being big wealthy nations, having these robust economies and how we\u2019d all done so well over the last number of years. As G7-G8 countries, we boast about having some of the healthiest economies, while millions of people live in poverty and homelessness.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s disturbing that governments implement a stay-home policy and [then fail] to eliminate homelessness. If our policies across the board are \u2018stay at home’ then you have to ensure everyone has a home in which to stay. That means ending homelessness,\u201d Farha said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe only way it doesn\u2019t is if you want to apply \u2018stay at home’ policies in a discriminatory fashion. One where the only people that can abide by that prescription have homes adequate enough to combat against the virus. Those who don\u2019t will not get that protection.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t want to live in a country where one’s wealth or income status determines their protection from a virus. In the face of this pandemic, a ventilator is no different than a home\u2026they could both save a life.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Interview with Leilani Farha, Former United Nations Special Rapporteur on the Global Right to Housing Leilani Farha wrapped up a six-year tenure as the United Nations\u2019 Special Rapporteur on the International Right to Housing at the end of May 2020. … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":21,"featured_media":14918,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[14097,389,444,452,8933,446,7159],"tags":[13939,13940,15188,253,832,515,1196,508,899,15189,7160],"coauthors":[13062],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14917"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/21"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=14917"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14917\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14918"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=14917"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=14917"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=14917"},{"taxonomy":"author","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wordpress-537697-2997182.cloudwaysapps.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/coauthors?post=14917"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}