Housing

TSRC is conducting research on a number of dimensions of third sector housing, including: 

• Housing associations
• mutual and cooperative housing
• homelessness advice and support
• the tenants’ and community movement
• self-help housing organisations
• social enterprises working in the homelessness field

Initial scoping papers provide an overview of the role played by third sector organisations with regard to housing in each of these sub-sectors. They explore what third sector housing is becoming, the implications of and for policy, and set an agenda for further research.

While these sub-sectors are to some extent overlapping, each presents a distinctive set of issues. They may be regarded as windows through which the diversity of the third sector can be seen. The papers explore:

• the historical development of the sub-sectors
• the numbers and types of organisations and typical activities
• the definitions used to define the sub-fields, and to establish boundaries with related fields
• the understandings of key actors within these fields
• the extent to which there is a common sense of ‘third sector identity’, and the components of this identity
• the existence of umbrella organisations and ‘field leaders’, and their external dependencies.

Read an overview of these scoping papers.

Research contact:
Professor David Mullins