The International Festival of Social Housing is a recurring event organized by a host city and Housing Europe, the european federation of public housing, co-operative and social, and its members and allies.
edition of 2023 was held in Barcelona from June 7 to June 9 ; it was attended by more than 2000 practitioner·nes, housing advocates·euses, the researchers·social workers and resident·es 82 countries, to exchange views on the current practices in the areas of affordable housing, in the framework of more than 100 events, tours and exhibitions are located in the city of Barcelona and its metropolitan area.
The Social Production of Habitat has occupied an important place in the programme, thanks to the visits of housing co-operatives inspiring organized by Sostre Civic, and coordination by urbaMonde a Community-Led Housing track in the official program involving several Network partners CoHabitat : Cooperative Housing International, Habitat International Coalition, Global Platform for the Right to the City, World Habitat, MOBA, European Community Land Trust Network, NETCO, Legacoop Abitanti, among others.
Throughout the festival, the intervening·es around the world have shared their experiences and best practices in this area, highlighting the importance of involving local communities in the planning and development of housing projects, and the way in which this can lead to results that are more sustainable, and more inclusive.
In recent years, the host city of Barcelona has become an example of the promotion of the right to adequate housing, in particular by the prevention of evictions and homelessness, and the support to cooperatives in the right-of-use to provide a proportion of affordable housing in the city need. Thanks to the political support for a social movement strong pre-existing habitat projects participatory developed and have become one of the leading providers of affordable housing and sustainable in Barcelona.
Just after the official opening of the festival, urbaMonde hosted 250 people at an event co-organized with the Network of Cities for Collaborative Housing (NETCO). Representative·the policy and practitioner·nes discussed the existing policies and pro-housing projects participatory in Vienna, Barcelona, Brussels, Lyon, and how to encourage these initiatives in The Hague. Successful collaboration between housing providers and groups of habitat participatory in France have also been presented. Read the details here
In collaboration with Cooperative Housing International Student Co-op Homes, Studentendorf Berlin and Hemlock, urbaMonde organized a session with inspiring experiences of housing co-ops for students·es of Switzerland, the United Kingdom, Germany, Spain and Italy. These cooperatives guarantee the right to education through access to affordable and adequate housing, support and empower the student·es throughout their university life.
UrbaMonde has also been invited to speak at an event organized by Legacoop, during which we had the chance to present the swiss model of housing cooperatives, highlighting the best practices in Zurich and Geneva, a panel speaker·es of the cities of Barcelona, Bologna, Lisbon and the dean of the urban school of Sciences Po Paris.
On 8 June, in collaboration with Sostre Civic, we have raised approximately 180 people from 22 countries involved or interested in the habitat participatory during an evening of networking at Nau Bostik, an old industrial factory converted into a social and cultural centre popular. The intense conversations and exchanges of contacts have taken place around the buffet, in a warm atmosphere of a summer evening. For many·guest·es, this event has allowed us to finally meet in person, after several years of video conferencing.
UrbaMonde also took advantage of the ISHF 23 to organise the annual meeting of the Network CoHabitat with the presence of a dozen partners for a day of reflections on the development and strengthening of the Network. We have funded the presence of the representative·es of the Asian Coalition for Housing Rights (ACHR), Catalytic Communities (Brasil), FUCVAM (Uruguay), MULTIPRO (Nicaragua) and Habitat Participatif France, which, without this support, would not have been able to benefit from this important meeting to unite our efforts in the promotion of the Social Production of Habitat.
Since the creation of the Network CoHabitat at the World Urban Forum (WUF) in Medellin in 2014, urbaMonde has developed a network of strong and diverse practitioner·nes that we have mobilized and gathered at major international events such as the MED 11 or the ISHF in Lyon, Helsinki, Barcelona, and again, in two years, Dublin for the ISHF25.
We are happy·es to see an increasing number of representative·es of local governments, stakeholders, ethical finance and real estate developers pioneers non-profit who wish to share their experiences or to learn how to associate with groups capita·es to experiment with a range of housing options that are affordable and sustainable, that respond to the multiple crises all our societies have to face.
We are grateful for·es to foundations and public agencies that we support in the organization of these events, the documentation and the sharing of policies and practices that are truly inspiring. However, our current funding covers only a portion of our costs and our time to this work, which generates a significant volunteer work on the part of our team to carry out these activities important in order to advance the Social Production of Habitat.
If you want to involve you in our work or support, please do not hesitate to contact us !
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