Metropolitics

A Social Portrait of the Subprime Crisis

Camille François & translated by Oliver Waine — 2021-05-14T05:00:00Z

What have been the social and urban consequences of the subprime mortgage crisis, and what lessons can be learned and applied to the current health and economic crisis? Isaac Martin and Christopher Niedt's 2015 work, Foreclosed America, paints a sociological portrait of households evicted from their homes in the United States.
The economic consequences of the Covid‑19 pandemic invite comparisons with previous global economic crises, not least the recent subprime crisis. This crisis, which

- Reviews / subprime, crisis, financial crisis, housing crisis, Covid-19, coronavirus, pandemic, United States, foreclosure, evictions, inequalities

The Actually Existing Markets of Shrinking Cities

Joshua Akers — 2017-04-18T05:00:00Z

In a bid to halt urban decline, Michigan's state government sought to create incentives for the creation of urban homesteads by accelerating the tax-foreclosure process. But what happens when city and county administrations don't play ball—and what are their motivations for doing so? Joshua Akers examines the adverse effects of a market-centric public policy.
---- Series: Shrinking Cities In the late 1990s, the state of Michigan bet on markets and urban pioneers to reinvigorate its struggling

- From the Field / housing, Chicago, housing policy, Los Angeles, real estate, public policy, foreclosure, Detroit, evictions, Michigan, shrinking cities, urban decline, urban homesteading, housing markets, Flint, homestead

Contesting Economies of Displacement and Dispossession

Joshua Akers — 2017-01-13T06:05:00Z

Joshua Akers describes Detroit's housing crisis, characterized by speculation, displacement, and increasingly violent evictions; and resistance through direct action, mapping, and the production of new data sets.
There is a housing crisis in the city of Detroit. This has quickened over the past decade. What emerged in the aftermath of the financial crisis is an economy of displacement and dispossession clawing away the homes and livelihoods of poor and lower-middle-class residents. It is

- From the Field / housing, crisis, displacement, Detroit, housing crisis, evictions, speculation, foreclosure

Dawn of the Indebted: Zombie Neoliberalism Hits the Big Screen

Desiree Fields & Tom Gillespie — 2016-03-08T06:00:00Z

As the tremors of the 2008 crumbling US housing market were felt around the world, even the most astute couldn't have predicted that its backstory would be adapted into not one but two Hollywood features. Desiree Fields and Tom Gillespie review The Big Short and 99 Homes—two films depicting landscapes where not even the winners of the game believe in it anymore.
Around the world, the US subprime mortgage market is understood as the epicenter of the near-implosion of the global economy in

- Reviews / financial crisis, housing, real estate, crisis, foreclosure, subprime, Wall Street, film, documentary

Interrupting Inequality: Crisis and Opportunity in Low-Income Housing Policy

Susan Saegert — 2015-01-26T05:50:00Z

Inequality in the United States is deeply rooted in issues of property ownership, wealth, race and class. Lower-income and minority households in the United States are constantly challenged in their struggle for decent stable housing by unaffordability and insecurity, exacerbated by the twin foreclosure and financial crises and its aftermath. Community land trusts seem to offer an alternative that can interrupt the cycle of crisis for both households and communities.
Inequality, property and

- Debates / homeownership, financial crisis, housing, housing policy, inequalities, United States, land, New York, crisis, rental, foreclosure, housing crisis, community land trusts, rent, rental housing, affordable housing

Finance as a New Terrain for Progressive Urban Politics

Desiree Fields — 2014-11-06T05:55:00Z

Since the foreclosure crisis, inequalities have only deepened in the US, with most wealth accruing to the 1%. Desiree Fields offers critical insights into what a progressive political countermovement that centers a narrative of finance with its thumb on the scale might look like.
The countermovement that wasn't
Many people, including me, believed that the global financial crisis that started in the US mortgage market signaled an unmistakable opening. Being so tightly linked to financial

- Debates / financial crisis, housing, inequalities, social movement, United States, crisis, rental, finance, foreclosure, progressive urban politics, rent, rental housing