4Social policy and homelessness
This chapter discusses multidisciplinary literature that examines the incorporation of intersectionality in policy development and analysis. I explore different policy-making and analysis approaches, focusing on Olena Hankivsky’s (2012b) Intersectionality-Based Policy Analysis (IBPA) and Carol Bacchi’s (2009) ‘What’s the problem represented to be?’(WPR). I critically examine definitions of homelessness in the USA, UK, Australia, the EU and New Zealand, and the widespread implementation of homelessness programmes such as Housing First. I also discuss Parken’s (2010) multi-strand approach that provides a step forward in institutionalising intersectional theorising in policy making. In this chapter I argue that policy research grounded in intersectionality can contribute to improving policy approaches to homelessness, especially by highlighting unequal power relations in the policy-making process.
Intersectionality has been used as a theoretical policy inquiry by scholars in the legal field (commencing with Kimberlee Crenshaw), in gender and politics (Yuval-Davis, 2006; Lombardo and Verloo, 2009), in public policy (such as Wilkinson, 2003), in sociology (Strid et al., 2013) and in health policy (Hankivsky, 2012a). In relation to social policy and social work, Murphy et al. (2009) and Bowie and Dopwell (2013) discuss the importance of intersectionality. Public policy and political science scholar Tiffany Manuel (2006, pp. 194–195) argues that because public policy is ‘reductionist’ and ‘incremental’, there are many challenges involved in incorporating intersectionality into traditional research and policy paradigms. The concern is that policy-making processes will simplify intersecting experiences of privilege and oppression (Wilkinson, 2003). There is a dearth of theorising about homelessness social policy making using intersectionality in social work literature. Therefore, this chapter draws on multidisciplinary intersectional policy analysis to examine definitions of homelessness and Housing First responses to the issue.
As previously mentioned, when first coined by Crenshaw, intersectionality was used as a tool to analyse discrimination legislation, in order to make visible the effects of policy making on African American women. Therefore, from its origins, intersectional policy analysis highlighted intersecting structural oppressions that marginalised particular population groups (Manuel, 2006). McCall’s (2005) categorical approaches can also contribute to intersectional policy analysis because policy making and analysis can be influenced by inter-categorical, intra-categorical and anti-categorical approaches. Using inter-categorical research and policy tools, inequalities between fixed and preselected groups can be measured across multiple dimensions, including how categories and inequalities change over time, such as wage indicators and income differences (McCall, 2005, p. 1790). The intra-categorical policy analysis approach can assist researchers to examine diversity within disadvantaged (and privileged) population groups (McCall, 2005). This can be seen in Asmara Carbado’s (2012) MA in Afro-American Studies, which employs the theory of intersectionality. Her thesis examines the 1806 Virginia Supreme Court decision, Hudgins v. Wright and how race is intersectionally constituted in legal processes. She argues that intra-categorical intersectionality is useful for examining the process by which a number of factors, such as physical appearance, gender, family background, white witnesses, reputation and judges’ personal views on slavery intersect to construct race in court processes (Carbado, 2012). As well, in the UK context, when theorising racism, social work scholar Masocha (2015) has focused on xenoracism (nationalism and racism). He examined racism in media representations and policy responses to asylum seekers, highlighted social work perspectives that counter hegemonic narratives about asylum seekers, as well as perspectives that engage in exclusionary processes that construct the Other (such as asylum seekers). As discussed in the previous chapter, I have drawn on an anti-categorical approach to deconstruct and unsettle dominant policy assumptions about homelessness as ‘houselessness’ (Zufferey and Chung, 2015), which will be further expanded on in this chapter. The social justice values that underpin intersectional policy analysis and research resonate with the ethics of social work. However, little social work research on intersectionality, homelessness and social policy could be found in literature.
Social work authors Norris et al. (2010, p. 63) note that policy-oriented scholars do articulate intersectional concepts. Building on Crenshaw’s (1991) ideas about over-inclusion and under-inclusion, they argue, however, that scholars have tended to emphasise one inequality analytically over intersecting multiple inequalities (Norris et al., 2010). Over-inclusion and under-inclusion can occur, when for example, theorising race and gender (Norris et al., 2010, p. 63; May, 2015). For example, when policy makers assume that ‘Black women’s political and economic interests will be achieved by meeting the demand for racial equality’, gender inequalities in Black communities are silenced and thus the ‘interests of Black men’ are privileged (Norris, et al., 2010, p. 63). Both gendered and racialised social inequalities intersect and constitute experiences of homelessness, along with other aspects, such as sexual orientation, disability, age, class, geographical location, religion and experiences of migration, being a refugee and experiencing violence. Therefore, intersectional policy making and analysis can explore how policies respond to intersecting and multiple discriminations simultaneously.
Incorporating intersectionality in policy making and analysis
Intersectionality has been used by social work scholars to develop, assess, evaluate, analyse and advocate for social research and policies that incorporate at least two or more ‘categories of oppression’ (Hulko, 2015, p. 71). This is relevant when examining policy responses to homelessness and considering if social policies are inclusive of intersecting diversities (Zufferey, 2015). However, intersectionality literature has tended to focus on ‘theoretical disagreement and abstract debates’ (Strid et al., 2013, p. 559). Few authors have explored how intersectionality is institutionalised in policy practice or social architecture (Verloo et al., 2012). Authors such as Lombardo and Verloo (2009) in Europe, Strid et al. (2013) in the UK and Bowie and Dopwell (2013) in the USA are notable for drawing on intersectionality to examine policies and policy-making processes.
In Europe, Verloo (2006) from the Netherlands, and Lombardo (Lombardo and Verloo, 2009) from Spain, examined reforms to equality law in European Union (EU) member states that aimed to address discrimination about gender, race and ethnicity, religion and belief, age, disability and sexuality. Lombardo and Verloo (2009, p. 479) contend that Crenshaw’s concept of ‘political intersectionality’ can enable ‘policymakers and activists to reflect on the dynamics of privilege and exclusion that emerge when people at the intersections of different inequalities are overlooked’. However, despite the Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union (2000), Verloo (2006) and Lombardo and Verloo (2009) argue that the EU response to the equality agenda from the Amsterdam Treaty onwards has been contested. This was evident when two separate but similar institutions – the European Institute for Gender Equality and the Fundamental Rights Agency – were created, reflecting alliances and contestations within European civil society (Lombardo and Verloo, 2009). Verloo (2006) highlighted few examples of intersectional responses and policies found in the United Nations that intersected race and gender. For example, in 2004, the ‘Committee on the Elimination of Racial Discrimination adopted a general recommendation on gender-related dimensions of racial discrimination (CRD/56/Misc21/Rev.3)’. As well, in 2001, The Commission on the Status of Women organised a panel on ‘Gender and all forms of discrimination, in particular racism, racial discrimination, xenophobia and related intolerance’ at its 45th session (Verloo, 2006, p. 214). More recently, Rashida Manjoo, Special Rapporteur on Violence Against Women for the United Nations (UN) Human Rights Council (United Nations General Assembly, 2014) argued that the intersectionality of political, economic, social, cultural, and gender factors obscure and exacerbate violence against women across the world, which also potentially shapes women’s experiences of homelessness.
The equity policies of the EU have traditionally tackled each equity strand (gender, race and ethnicity, disability, sexual orientation and nationality) separately, such as through the introduction of the Racial Equality Directive, Employment Equality Directive 2000 and Equal Treatment Directive 2002, each covering different forms of discrimination (Kantola, 2009). In a move towards addressing equality mainstreaming and multiple discriminations, the focus has shifted away from gender and towards racial discrimination, which has ‘created unrest amongst feminists in European politics and law’ (Kantola, 2009, p. 22). Verloo (2006, p. 211) noted that policy practice ‘seldom refers to intersectionality when trying to deal with multiple inequalities’ and that intersections are rarely addressed in EU policies. She argued that ‘one size fits all’ policy approaches addressing multiple discriminations are based on an incorrect assumption of sameness and ignores the processes that constitute inequalities (Verloo, 2006, p. 211). Lombardo and Verloo (2009, p. 478) conclude that the EU legal framework is ‘juxtaposing inequalities rather than intersecting them and is not giving equal importance to the different inequalities’. Therefore, as inequalities are framed and experienced differently, the challenge for policy makers would be to respond to intersecting social inequalities, as well as differences and similarities between and within different population groups.
Similarly, Kantola and Nousiainen (2009, p. 459) from Finland and Turkey, draw a distinction between ‘intersectionality’ and ‘multiple discrimination’ and argued that ‘the EU focuses on the latter … favouring anti-discrimination policy’. Whilst these policies are intended to tackle multiple and intersecting discriminations, political and legal institutions such as marriage, parenting and inheritance law govern and reproduce inequalities and have the power to remedy some inequalities and ‘ignore and silence others’ (Kantola and Nousiainen, 2009, p. 462). They note that inequalities can differ according to ‘choice’ (for example, a person can choose his/her religion but not their age) and ‘visibility’ (for example, sexuality can be hidden but gender or skin colour cannot), and that social locations can change over time (for example, age and disability alter over time but most people will not change their sex). These social markers are then responded to in various ways in different social institutions (Kantola and Nousiainen, 2009, p. 468) that can be oppressive or privileging.
In the UK, Strid et al. (2013) emphasised that intersectionality is particularly important for policy making. They analysed British policies (2001–2011) on domestic violence (which included homelessness), sexual violence and forced marriage, to show how intersectionality can improve policy. When examining multiple inequalities, such as ‘age, class, disability, ethnicity/race, gender, immigrant status, religion/belief and sexual orientation’, they argued that there are different (but limited) visibilities of multiple inequalities (Strid et al., 2013, p. 566). They identified the following three different visibilities: when inequalities are simply named in policies (which is the least inclusive and visible), when ‘intersecting inequalities, fields and domains’ are highlighted in policies and when ‘the voices of minoritised women’ are included in the policy process, with ‘outcomes through civil society’, such as the development of coalitions and alliances between women’s organisations (Strid et al., 2013, pp. 566, 599). A number of authors have claimed that multiple inequalities and intersectionality are invisible in policies on violence against women (Nixon and Humphreys, 2010; Hankivsky and Cormier, 2011; Zufferey et al., 2016). On the other hand, Strid et al.’s (2013, p. 574) analysis of British policies on sexual assault, domestic violence and forced marriages note that the inclusion of intersecting inequalities in policies range from ‘weak inclusion in policy on sexual offences’ (that is, simply the naming of differences), to ‘moderate inclusion in policy on domestic violence’ and strong inclusion of minoritised women’s voices in shaping ‘policy on forced marriage’ (Strid et al., 2013, p. 574) consistent with the social justice aims of intersectionality. However, these authors also noted that domestic violence policies and legislation are increasingly degendered, and whilst degendered aspects can be intersectional, ‘violence against women cannot be efficiently combated when policy is degendered to the point where gender becomes invisible’ (Strid et al., 2013, p. 575). This would be equally relevant to intersecting gender with other categories of disadvantage in homelessness policies, including focusing specifically on both women’s and men’s homelessness. However, when examining Australian homelessness policy, I found that discussions of power and gender inequalities are often missing (Zufferey, 2011).
In the US policy context, Bowie and Dopwell (2013, p. 190) argued that intersectionality research is a viable alternative when examining the outcomes and the flaws of the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) programme. These flaws include its contradictory logic about employment searches, work incentives and the lack of available living-wage jobs. They argued that intersectional research of the TANF programme can highlight social and policy inequalities, such as:
(1) the social and political construction of TANF; (2) its emphasis on macroinstitutional and microintimate partner power relations (e.g., TANF-reliant women, public welfare case managers, and low-wage employers in the business community) that create and sustain social hierarchies; and (3) the perspectives and experiences of different oppressed groups, especially women of color, and (4) it is interdisciplinary and driven by the pursuit of social justice.
(Bowie and Dopwell, 2013, p. 190)
The policy-making process involves an assessment of social justice, society’s wellbeing and the distribution of finite resources to address it (Murphy et al., 2009, p. 62). According to Bowie and Dopwell (2013, pp. 177–178), President Franklin Delano Roosevelt’s New Deal that responded to the economic crisis of the early 1930s was an early example of this process, resulting in ‘the creation of what was perceived to be a socially just minimum safety net for low-income and impoverished Americans’. As a component of the Social Security Act of 1935, the federal government created Aid to Dependent Children (which later became Aid to Families with Dependent Children, AFDC) and provided cash assistance to eligible poor families. The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Reconciliation Act of 1996 (PRWORA) abolished AFDC and replaced it with Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF). The TANF is an income support programme with a ‘work first philosophy’ and ‘strict enforcement of welfare-to-work guidelines, penalties and financial sanctions for noncompliance with regulations and more restrictive eligibility criteria’ (Bowie and Dopwell, 2013, pp. 177–178). These policies are particularly relevant to families who are homeless and poor in the USA.
Bowie and Dopwell’s (2013) study focused on the ‘metastressors’, such as labour market issues, housing and environmental issues, family stressors, interpersonal violence, mental and physical ill-health and barriers to employment and career outcomes, as experienced by 30 TANF-reliant African and Latino women. They argued that TANF structures and regulations are designed to ‘control and oppress women, particularly those who are single, impoverished and heads of households’, and that by design, the public welfare system ‘perpetuates poverty, second-class citizenship and inequality in the United States’ (Bowie and Dopwell, 2013, p. 179). These policies purposely ‘contribute to providing low wage labor’ while state-defined ‘success’ means exiting from TANF assistance, which can then exacerbate family, community and social problems (Bowie and Dopwell, 2013, p. 179). For example, many people living in poverty are employed but their wages are too low to pay for housing. This state of affairs reflects the residual approach to social welfare in the United States, the United Kingdom and Australian welfare systems (Esping-Andersen, 1990). Whilst welfare policies and service responses are intended to ameliorate disadvantage, structural or institutional inequalities can be ignored, including persistent homophobia, racism or sexism faced by diverse population groups when accessing employment or housing.
Intersectionality is useful to highlight the intersecting complexities that constitute social policy-making processes, and to examine whose voices are heard and whose voices are missing in policy development (Bowie and Dopwell, 2013). Whilst academic scholars are committed to addressing inequalities through intersectionality, as an instrument of political and social change, social policies have been critiqued for failing to address ‘experiences of intersectional discrimination’, especially for marginalised women (Ferree, 2009; Norris et al., 2010, p. 63). Social policies (such as those addressing homelessness) can risk privileging some and ignoring other social inequalities, reproducing power relations and failing to address intersecting inequalities that constitute homelessness. It remains important to ask who defines the differences (and similarities) that are recognised in policy making and ‘when, where, which and why’ are these of focus (Ludvig, 2006, p. 247). These relations of power are important to consider when examining social policy responses to homelessness, such as how intersections are presented, in relation to competing categorisations of social inequalities. To incorporate intersectionality and address intersecting power differentials, policy-making and policy analysis becomes complicated.
There are different models about the cyclic stages in policy making. These models range from simpler four stage models involving planning, formulation, implementation and evaluation, to more complicated eight stage ones, that include issue identification, policy analysis, policy instrumentation, consultation, coordination, decision making, implementation and evaluation (Carson and Kerr, 2014, p. 85). Social work policy makers rely on multidisciplinary assessments and assume that many different interests and government entities are involved in a multi-staged and continuous policy process (Murphy et al., 2009, pp. 59–60). Drawing on Dunn’s (1994) public policy model of analysis, Murphy et al. (2009) argue that policy definition, agenda setting, policy adoption, policy implementation and policy evaluation are relevant to social work practice. They call for social workers to be involved in all stages of the policy-making process as well as policy research, analysis, advocacy and critique.
Policy making and analysis is varied and contested. Mayer et al. (2004, p. 15) argue that there are six different styles of policy analysis, which asks different questions. For example, the rational style asks ‘What is good knowledge?’; the argumentative style asks ‘What is good for the debate?’; the client advice style asks ‘What is good for the client/problem owner?’; the participatory style asks ‘What is good for democratic society?’; the process style asks ‘What is good for the process?’; and the interactive style asks ‘What is good for mutual understanding?’ Murphy et al. (2009, p. 60) note that social workers utilise an eclectic approach to policy analysis that incorporates aspects of these different policy theories. Social work policy analysis in the field of homelessness can include any (or a mix of) these styles, depending on the purposes of the analysis.
In Canada, intersectionality has been used to assist health care scholars and policy analysts to question ‘how is policy done?’ (Hankivsky and Cormier, 2011, p. 220). Hankivsky and her colleagues (Hankivsky and Christoffersen, 2008; Hankivsky and Cormier, 2009; Hankivsky and Cormier, 2011; Hankivsky, 2011; Hankivsky, 2012a; 2012b; Hankivsky et al., 2014) have developed Intersectionality-Based Policy Analysis (IBPA) as a framework for analysing health and public policy. Hankivsky and Cormier (2011) discuss different theoretical approaches to intersectional public policy analysis. One potential approach replaces the notion of ‘context’ with ‘space’ as an analytical dimension in intersectionality policy analysis. This theoretical shift includes historically contextualising policies, the purposes and authors of the text, how power dimensions are re-produced in the text and the relationships between power and agency (Rönnblom, 2008, p. 2). This approach to intersectional policy analysis is potentially relevant to examining exclusionary policy responses to homelessness in urban places and spaces (Zufferey, 2016). Urban space scholars refer to ‘new geographies’ of wealth and exclusion, ‘shelter deprivation’ and cities being constituted by unequal social, economic and political relations, with class, race, ethnicity and gender continuing to be ‘key markers of urban inequality’ (Stevenson, 2013, p. 3; Tonkiss, 2013, p. 22). As Kennelly and Watt (2011, p. 768) argue, ‘urban spaces are not neutral … they carry the weight of political, social and cultural processes that create distinctive areas of leisure, employment, housing and destitution’. Thus, urban policy responses potentially increase the polarisation between the rich and poor and the surveillance of more marginalised population groups, such as people who experience literal homelessness.
An intersectional policy analysis approach can also focus on reconceptualising policy initiatives at different stages of the policy cycle, through using case studies. For example, Murphy et al. (2009, p. 67) applied intersectional policy process analysis to a case study (Natalia) about sex trafficking. In their intersectional policy analysis they include: exploring the social, political and economic definition of the problem; determining who is central to the agenda setting and adoption of the policy; identifying what agencies will implement the policy; and determining how the policy can be evaluated (Murphy et al., 2009). As well, Bishwakarma et al. (2007 p. 34) examined Nepalese education policy strategies developed within the Tenth Development Plan (2002–2007) and their ‘effectiveness’ in addressing the exclusion of Dalit (oppressed or ‘untouchable’) women, through ‘the lens of the intersection of caste and gender’. These authors strived to systematically integrate intersectionality in the policy-making and analysis processes. Whilst these authors are not all social workers, I posit that intersectional policy analysis can also be used effectively by social workers who make and analyse policy in the field of homelessness.
In this chapter, I ask intersectional policy analysis questions to examine statutory policy definitions of homelessness that can shape social work practice in the USA, UK, Australia and the European Union. As well, I examine Housing First policy responses to homelessness in the USA, UK, Canada, Europe and Australia. First, I will outline the questions posed in two policy analysis frameworks: Hankivsky’s (2012b) IBPA and Bacchi’s (2009) ‘What’s the problem represented to be?’ (WPR). These frameworks are used to question homelessness policy definitions in the USA, UK, Australia and the EU, and to examine the implementation of Housing First initiatives.
Policy analysis frameworks: Intersectionality-Based Policy Analysis (IBPA) and ‘What’s the problem represented to be?’ (WPR)
The notion of Intersectionality-Based Policy Analysis (IBPA) provides a new method for understanding equity based implications of policy. This approach aims to promote improvements in policy development and highlight social justice for diverse population groups, especially in health policy (Hankivsky, 2012a; 2012b). IBPA offers guiding principles for examining intersecting categories, which includes reflecting on multilevel analyses of power, reflexivity, time and space, giving voice to diverse knowledges, as well as advocating for social justice and equity. Hankivsky et al. (2014, p. 1) argue that IBPA is a critical policy analysis that ‘captures the different dimensions of policy contexts, including history, politics, everyday lived experiences, diverse knowledges and intersecting social locations’, and that ‘generates transformative insights’ and policy solutions. However, IBPA has predominantly been used in public and health policies, and I have not been able to find its application to any homelessness policy development or analysis in social work literature.
Intersectionality-Based Policy Analysis (IBPA) 1 consists of five descriptive questions and seven transformative questions. The five descriptive questions start with self-reflexivity, examining historical constructions of contemporary problems (such as homelessness) and outlining policy intentions. These questions ask: What knowledge, values and experiences do you bring to this area of policy analysis? What is the policy ‘problem’ under consideration? How have representations of the ‘problem’ come about? How are groups differentially affected by this representation of the ‘problem’? What are the current policy responses trying to achieve? (Hankivsky, 2012b, pp. 39–40). The seven Intersectionality-Based Policy Analysis (IBPA) transformative questions ask: What inequities actually exist in relation to the problem and what potential approaches can be used to promote discussion of the problem? Where and how can interventions be made to improve the problem? What are feasible short-, medium- and long-term solutions? How will proposed policy responses reduce inequities and promote social justice? How will implementation and uptake be assured? How will you know if inequities have been reduced? How has the process of engaging in an intersectionality-based policy analysis transformed thinking about relations and structures of power and inequity? (Hankivsky, 2012b, pp. 40–42). One example of an intersectional policy process is Parken’s (2010) Multi-Strand Method in the UK, which is discussed later in the chapter. As well, service user-led research in Housing First by ‘The People with Lived Experience Caucus’ in Canada (Coltman et al., 2015) is also an example of inclusive intersectional research and policy practice, which is mentioned in this chapter, but further discussed in Chapter 6. Potentially both examples are innovative approaches to intersectional policy implementation and evaluation, incorporating intersecting inequalities and the diverse voices of service users.
The five IBPA descriptive questions are similar to Bacchi’s (2009, p. vii) ‘What’s the problem represented to be?’ (WPR) framework that deconstructs the ‘problem solving’ discourse in public policy, through a ‘problem questioning’ policy analysis. The WPR approach provides an analysis of the policy process of ‘governing’ (such as by social workers), in relation to people who are ‘governed’ (Bacchi, 2009, p. vii), such as people who are defined as homeless. The WPR methodology includes the following questions: What is the problem represented to be in a specific policy? What presuppositions or assumptions underlie this representation of the problem? How has this representation of the problem come about? What is left unproblematic in this problem representation? Where are the silences? Can the problem be thought about differently? What effects are produced by this representation of the problem? How/where has this representation of the problem been produced, disseminated and defended? How could it be questioned, disrupted and replaced? (Bacchi, 2009, p. 2). This WPR policy analysis framework, which is more post structural in emphasis, resonates with the anti-categorical approach (McCall, 2005) that can assist social workers to deconstruct the problematising of homelessness in policy responses.
When examining the effects of policy discourses on individual subjectivities, Bacchi (2009, p. 15) identifies three interconnecting effects of particular representations of social problems such as homelessness. The first are discursive effects (for example, the limits that are imposed on what can be thought of and said about homelessness). The second are subjectification effects (for example, how the subjectivities of people experiencing homelessness are constituted in media and policy discourse). The third are lived experience effects, for example, the impact of these representations on the experiences of people subjected to the discourse/s of homelessness (Zufferey, 2014). I have previously utilised the WPR approach to examine print media representations of homelessness in Australia and found that public depictions of people who experience homelessness can reinforce deep-seated community values that maintain unequal gender, class and racialised power relations. These social constructions, such as expecting social workers to ‘fix’ problems such as homelessness, frequently ignore the strengths and agency of service users (Zufferey, 2014, p. 527).
Intersectional policy analysis requires an understanding and assessment of how power is produced and unevenly distributed through society’s social structures, institutions, organisations and ‘everyday interactions’ (Murphy et al., 2009, p. 62). The examination of ‘interlocking structures of oppression’ is valuable for analysing social inequalities and the impact of policies on different social groups (Murphy et al., 2009, p. 62), including people who experience homelessness. When considering relevant policies, it is important to highlight statutory definitions of homelessness that are designed primarily to ration access to public resources, within particular welfare state contexts and unequal power relations.
Problem definition and agenda setting in homelessness
Problem definition in policy making is a ‘matter of representation’, which is connected to how a social problem (such as homelessness) is constructed and promoted by strategic lobby groups (Murphy et al., 2009, p. 61). In the agenda-setting phase, policy makers negotiate social issues for government action, as influenced by political lobbying and diverse community groups (Murphy et al., 2009, p. 60; Carson and Kerr, 2014). Homelessness has historically been responded to by the voluntary sector and non-government agencies, as powerful lobby groups in this field of practice.
Alongside lobby groups (such as non-government agencies), the news media can shape policy agendas and contribute to increasing public awareness and concern for salient issues such as homelessness. The news media does not only reflect reality but filters and shapes it. The media interest on particular issues such as homelessness can influence the public to perceive that some social issues are more important than others, and can homogenise and promote standardised definitions and solutions to the issue (Zufferey, 2014). Reflecting media representations of homelessness, policy responses to homelessness have concentrated on literal, primary or visible homelessness, such as ‘rough sleeping’ in Britain and Australia, and ‘street people’ in America, or housing chronically homeless people who are deemed to be costly to the government (Stanhope and Dunn, 2011). These ‘chronically homeless’ are currently being responded to through Housing First policies and service initiatives. However, attention on homelessness as ‘rough sleeping’ and on chronic homelessness means that policies have tended to concentrate on men, who are more likely to experience and remain literally and chronically homeless (Passaro, 1996/2014). The next section examines how homelessness is statutorily defined in the USA, UK, Australia, European Union and New Zealand. It asks questions about how policies and legislation represent and respond to homelessness and what is missing when thinking about policies using intersectional policy analysis.
Statutory definitions of homelessness
In the USA, the Stewart B. McKinney Homeless Act of 1987 (Pub L. No.100–77) was the first federal law that provided money for emergency food and homeless shelters. In 2009, President Obama signed the Homeless Emergency Assistance and Rapid Transition to Housing (HEARTH) Act of 2009, which now emphasises permanent supportive housing and rapid re-housing (within 30 days). This strategy is consistent with the Housing First approaches also being promoted in Europe, the UK and Australia. In addition, Section 103 of the McKinney-Vento Homeless Assistance Act (42 U.S.C. 11302) has amended statutory definitions in Sec. 1003 of the HEARTH Act, which covers an individual or family who lacks an ‘adequate night time residence’, such as living in a car, park, abandoned building, bus or train station, airport, camping ground or ‘place not meant for human habitation’, living in a service/shelter, as well as people ‘at risk’ of imminently losing housing, including those that people own, rent or live in. This Act also legislates to respond to chronicity and ‘life threatening conditions’, which highlights multiple social inequalities:
chronic disabilities, chronic physical health or mental health conditions, substance addiction, histories of domestic violence or childhood abuse, the presence of a child or youth with a disability, or multiple barriers to employment [as well as] any individual or family who is fleeing, or is attempting to flee, domestic violence, dating violence, sexual assault, stalking, or other dangerous or life-threatening conditions [and] lack the resources or support networks to obtain other permanent housing.
(HEARTH Act, 2009, Sec. 1003)
This definition concentrates on chronic homelessness but also represents the issue as covering people ‘at risk’ of losing their housing and experiencing domestic violence. Thus, this definition moves beyond the category of homelessness being ‘street people’. As such, homelessness is represented as being related to chronic health conditions, disabilities and addictions, as well as emergencies and access to resources. The policy does cover multiple social issues but does not consider how they intersect, how unequal power relations are produced and how discriminatory practices contribute to homelessness. For example, persistent and institutionalised racialised, gendered and classed discrimination in housing, employment and health policies and practices particularly affect African American individuals, families and communities, who are more likely to become homeless and have lower homeownership rates (Jewell, 2003).
In Britain, the original (as enacted) Housing (Homeless Persons Act) 1977 Section 1 defined homelessness as lack of housing: ‘no accommodation, or accommodation which he/she cannot secure entry to’. Furthermore, homelessness includes if one’s housing is a ‘movable structure, vehicle or vessel designed or adapted for human habitation … with no place where he is entitled or permitted both to place it and to reside in it’. Thus, the original UK definition of homelessness covers people ‘sleeping rough’ (such as on the streets or in a car or ‘moveable structure’); those staying in temporary homeless accommodation and also those about to lose their accommodation (‘threatened with homelessness’), or living in ‘unreasonable’ accommodation, where it is substandard or there is a threat of domestic violence (Robson and Poustie, 1996). The specific reference to ‘domestic’ violence was edited in 2002, now defined more broadly as: ‘(a) violence from another person; or (b) threats of violence from another person which are likely to be carried out’ (Homelessness Act 2002, Section 10). The Acts also discussed local housing authorities developing homelessness strategies to prevent homelessness, secure sufficient accommodation and provide ‘satisfactory provision of support for people in their district who are or may become homeless’. However, despite the rhetorical intent of these policies, they have not contributed to transforming power relations.
In tracing the history of the development of this Act, Crowson (2012, p. 23) argues that although faith-based lobby groups shaped and framed the public debate about homelessness from the late 1950s onwards, they have had ‘little direct control over the creation and amendment of legislation’. Crowson (2012) noted that political institutions implementing government policies are constituted by heteronormative, racialised and classed discourses that continue to view homelessness as an individual, welfare issue. For example, people who are homeless continue to be constructed as victims and represented as ‘marginal and troublesome’ (Meers, 2012). Furthermore, this Act was critiqued for institutionalising the notion of ‘intentional’ and ‘unintentional’ homelessness, and responding to people only within locality-based connections (such as local government areas), which did not reduce transient homelessness and housing shortages (Crowson, 2012). Furthermore, according to section 186, ‘an asylum-seeker, or a dependant of an asylum-seeker’ is ineligible for housing assistance in the United Kingdom.
The original Housing (Homeless Persons) Act 1977, Section 2 also defined priority need for accommodation. The Housing Act 1996 and Homelessness Act 2002 defined priority need for accommodation in Section 189 as:
(a) a pregnant woman or a person with whom she resides or might reasonably be expected to reside; (b) a person with whom dependent children reside or might reasonably be expected to reside; (c) a person who is vulnerable as a result of old age, mental illness or handicap or physical disability or other special reason, or with whom such a person resides or might reasonably be expected to reside; (d) a person who is homeless or threatened with homelessness as a result of an emergency such as flood, fire or other disaster.
This response to homelessness focuses on prioritising ‘disadvantaged’ population groups, on the basis of social need categories, such as pregnancy, children, age, ability, socioeconomic status and mental health. The provision of statutory homelessness assistance is reported to have improved for families with dependents (Fitzpatrick and Pleace, 2012, p. 246). However, single people without serious health issues have tended to be defined as less deserving and are more often, intentionally homeless (Fitzpatrick and Pleace, 2012, p. 246; Crowson, 2012). The term ‘vulnerable’ has also been critiqued for being too vague, acting as a ‘gate keeping’ device for local housing authorities in deciding who is ‘vulnerable’ and in practice, encouraging a deserving/underserving mentality towards homelessness dating back to the Poor Laws (Kennett, 2003; Meers, 2012). Thus, UK legal and policy responses to homelessness prioritise ‘vulnerability’ and unintentional homelessness, including ‘natural disasters’. The Act does shape responses to homelessness as a social and civic responsibility. However, it makes no mention of intersecting ‘vulnerabilities’ or social inequalities.
In Australia, the Australian Bureau of Statistics (ABS) defines homelessness as:
When a person does not have suitable accommodation alternatives they are considered homeless if their current living arrangement: is in a dwelling that is inadequate; or has no tenure, or if their initial tenure is short and not extendable; or does not allow them to have control of, and access to space for social relations.
(ABS, 2012)
This definition covers adequacy of the dwelling, security of tenure and control of and social access to spaces within a house (ABS, 2012). This aligns with definitions of ‘home’ in Anglo American and European interpretations that highlight a sense of security, stability, privacy, safety and the ability to control one’s living space (Mallett, 2004). However, a person who is experiencing domestic violence and remains in their unsafe home with the perpetrator tends not to be considered homeless because of the difficulties measuring these circumstances (ABS, 2012). This definition also makes no mention of intersecting social inequalities and social processes that contribute to homelessness.
Tiered or pathway definitions of homelessness are influential in Australia, and include Chamberlain’s (1999) primary, secondary, tertiary and marginal categories of homelessness. Primary (or literal) homelessness is akin to ‘rough sleepers’ or rooflessness. Secondary homelessness includes people with no place of usual residence (such as ‘couch surfing’ or living in temporary shelters). Tertiary homelessness includes people who are inappropriately or insecurely housed, living in culturally defined substandard accommodation. Marginal housing refers to people who are ‘at risk’ of homelessness, such as those living in boarding houses, being in financial housing crisis or overcrowding. These policy representations of homelessness imply a pathways approach, a linear progression and a continuum of homelessness. The solution to homelessness is represented as ‘suitable’ housing and homeownership is assumed to be the most desired outcome of housing policies. There is some mention of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander experiences of homelessness (ABS, 2012) but nothing about intersecting social discriminations.
Similarly, the European Typology of Homelessness and Housing Exclusion (ETHOS) also defines homelessness on a continuum of roofless to inadequate housing (Amore et al., 2011). ETHOS defines homelessness as: roofless, houseless, insecure, inadequate and temporary housing, such as mobile homes. The ETHOS conceptual model was developed by housing scholars Joe Doherty, Bill Edgar and Hank Meert to include social, physical and legal domains of housing and home (Doherty et al., 2004; Amore et al., 2011). This definition has been noted to not always be measurable, and only focusing on places of habitation at one point in time, and not on environmental circumstances (Amore et al., 2011).
In New Zealand (NZ), housing and health scholars Amore et al. (2011, pp. 22–23) argued that homelessness definitions need to consider: cultural, institutionalised and governance contexts, conceptualisations regarding how to measure categories, operational aspects that relate to the ‘real world’, such as measuring homelessness prevalence, incidence and over the lifetime, as well as whether there is a system that makes measuring homelessness possible, practical, acceptable and affordable. The New Zealand definition of homelessness refers to ‘living in a place of habitation that is below a minimum adequacy standard’ and ‘lacking access to adequate housing’, which are intersected with social, physical and legal domains of home (Amore et al., 2011, p. 32). For example, having no accommodation would fulfil the criteria of ‘physically inadequate, socially inadequate, and legally insecure living situations’; temporary accommodation would be ‘socially inadequate and legally insecure living situations’; sharing accommodation with friends or family would be ‘physically inadequate and legally insecure living situations’; and ‘uninhabitable housing’ would be ‘physically and socially inadequate living situations’ (Amore et al., 2011, p. 33). Therefore, the NZ definition builds on the ETHOS definition by intersecting social, physical and legal domains with different housing circumstances.
Nonetheless, statutory definitions in the USA, UK, Australia, NZ and the EU all imply that homelessness is the lack of housing, thereby constructing homelessness as a housing problem. These definitions of homelessness do aim to reduce housing inequalities and promote housing justice. However, such definitions measure homelessness according to normative housing categories and assume that ‘home’ or housing is a safe place (Tomas and Dittmar, 1995, p. 493). Assumptions that housing is the solution and homelessness is the problem do not always acknowledge diverse and contested meanings and experiences of home and homelessness (Somerville, 1992; 2013). Left unexamined are the broader political debates about the intersecting contributors to homelessness. For example, how do classing, gendering, racialising and heteronormative policy-making processes intersect and shape homelessness? This reflexive attention to power relations in the policy-making process is central to intersectional policy making and social work.
It has also been noted that the existence of homelessness is a consequence of how housing policies are failing to cope with social and economic changes to the housing and labour markets. What is invisible in these definitions of homelessness is that social housing has been a low priority for many governments, who tend to favour homeownership policies. Yet homeownership is unachievable for many disadvantaged people. Certainly, the housing policies of different countries vary. However, there is insufficient space in this book on homelessness to discuss the housing policies in each country in the EU and each state in the US, particularly as they are aligned to different welfare systems (see other books, for example, Balchin, 1996; Schwartz, 2015). In Australia, homeownership (along with employment) has been the ‘cornerstone of the Australian welfare state’ but increasing house prices to income ratios has decreased housing affordability (Carson and Kerr, 2014, p. 194). Housing trends influenced by neoliberal market reforms to the welfare state have reduced the availability of public and affordable housing (Carson and Kerr, 2014). Government policies have curtailed the funding of public housing, average house prices have increased relative to income, average monthly repayments on home loans have increased, the proportion of first homebuyers has fallen and there is increasing competition for housing in the private rental market, where landlords exercise considerable discretion in choice of tenant (SACOSS, 2007, p. 79). Moreover the Indigenous household rate of homeownership is one-third compared to two-thirds of non-Indigenous households (AIHW, 2011). These housing trends also affect women because of their lower income, inequalities in the labour market and the ‘gender pay gap’ (ABS, 2014). Home ownership is lower for female sole parents (41 per cent) than male sole parents (50 per cent) and more men (80 per cent) than women (74 per cent) over the age of 75 years own their home outright (ABS, 2013). These statistics enable social workers to question who benefits and who loses in the implementation of housing, homeownership and homelessness policies. My argument is that an intersectional analysis can contribute to understanding how intersecting social and housing disadvantages continue to be maintained, including by favouring homeownership policies.
Typically, social workers are employed within a residual model of welfare involved in providing services to the most disadvantaged and to meeting people’s ‘basic needs’ (Zufferey, 2008; Carson and Kerr, 2014, p. 11). Within these different welfare state constraints, it remains important for social workers to ask questions about how standardised policies can address the specific consequences of oppression for different disadvantaged groups, especially if intersections are not specified in social policies (Bishwakarma et al., 2007, p. 34). The next section focuses on Housing First policy formulation and implementation and asks questions about how proposed policy solutions reduce social inequalities and promote social justice.
Policy formulation and implementation of Housing First
As Hankivsky (2012b) and Bishwakarma et al. (2007, p. 29) note, the following two questions are fundamental in policy formulation: What kind of programme/policy is envisioned? What are the desired or intended results? After identifying and researching the problem, policy formulation identifies options for intervention that are politically, socially and economically influenced (Carson and Kerr, 2014, p. 87). Currently, the favoured homelessness policy initiatives in Europe, Canada, USA and Australia relate to ‘housing the homeless’, such as through ‘Housing First’ approaches.
The formulation and implementation of Housing First initiatives that aim to provide permanent accommodation and support services for the chronically homeless, align with assumptions in statutory definitions of homelessness that represent the problem of homelessness as a lack of housing, caused by chronic disabilities. Social work authors from the USA Deborah Padgett, Benjamin Henwood and Sam Tsemberis have thoroughly examined Housing First (HF) in their new book, which includes a chapter of personal stories of individuals who experienced HF. They trace the ‘homeless industry’ of shelters, not for profit, religious and philanthropic organisations and advocacy groups, and the story of Housing First that resisted dominant ideas such as treatment first, sobriety and housing readiness (Padgett et al., 2015). The formulation of Housing First included fundamental principles such as: consumer choice, harm reduction, immediate access to permanent independent housing in the community, that housing is a basic human right, client self-determination, respect, a commitment to working with clients for as long as they need, independent apartments, the separation of housing and treatment services, and a recovery orientation (Tsemberis, 2010; Padgett et al., 2015). The policy intentions of Housing First approaches were to permanently house and support an individual according to their individual ‘needs and preferences’ (Benjaminsen, 2014, p. 12). Housing First principles are also seen to be positive and consistent with social work ethics and values (Benjaminsen, 2014).
Housing First approaches have been implemented and transferred across the Western world. The Housing First pathway models taken up in the UK and Europe were developed by Beyond Shelter Inc. in 1988 in Los Angeles and Pathways to Housing in New York in 1990 (Tsemberis, 2010). The Housing First approach was promoted as an alternative to ‘treatment first’ (such as for mental illness), the ‘housing care continuum’ and transitional responses to homelessness, such as commencing from the ‘streets’ to crisis services and emergency shelters, to transitional housing and then ‘independent living’. In Canada, the five year ‘At Home/Chez Soi’ project was launched in five cities (2009–2013), each with a particular area of focus: Vancouver concentrated on people also experiencing problematic substance use; Winnipeg responded to the urban Aboriginal population; Toronto gave particular attention to ethno-racialised populations, including new immigrants who do not speak English; Montréal included a vocational study; and Moncton provided a smaller city community service. This Canadian response illustrates the flexibility of Housing First.
The Housing First emphasis has also influenced the EU response to homelessness, especially since the European Parliament passed a written declaration on ending homelessness in 2007. Called the ‘Housing First Europe’ project, the model was trialled in 10 European cities (Amsterdam, Budapest, Copenhagen, Glasgow, Lisbon, Dublin, Ghent, Gothenburg, Helsinki and Vienna) from August 2011 to July 2013 (Benjaminsen and Dyb, 2010; Benjaminsen, 2014). Following the same principles as the Canadian and American projects, in 2010, the French government launched a Housing First programme in Paris, Toulouse, Marseille and Lille called ‘Un Chez-Soi d’abord’, focusing on people with mental illness or drug and alcohol addictions.
The supportive accommodation model taken up in Australia, called Common Ground, was founded in Time Square, New York City in the 1990s with the aim of ending chronic homelessness (Parsell et al., 2014). This approach has had a massive and rapid uptake across Australia, involving building inner city apartments for people who are homeless and providing intensive support. In the implementation process, ‘professional intuition and personal experience were afforded a higher status than formal evaluative evidence’ (Parsell et al., 2014, p. 69). Promoted in the national government’s homelessness policy The Road Home (2008), Housing First aims to increase the supply of affordable housing as central to reducing homelessness (Australian Government, 2008). However, even these Housing First-focused approaches have been criticised for being ‘one size fits all’ approaches that predominantly address housing and do not address other intersecting, structural oppressions that contribute to poverty and homelessness (Stanhope and Dunn, 2011).
In Australia, alongside Housing First responses (such as Common Ground) ‘assertive outreach’ initiatives have emerged that reach out to ‘rough sleepers’ to move them into housing. However, it is important to consider whose voices are missing in policies and responses aimed to move people from ‘the streets’ to ‘house the homeless’ (Zufferey and Chung, 2006). For example, Indigenous people are being displaced from their land and inner city meeting places where they have significant spiritual connections. Indeed, the perspectives of Indigenous Australians and land ownership debates are rarely considered in policy-making processes about homelessness (Zufferey and Kerr, 2004). This raises questions about whose perspectives are being heard and privileged, which has implications for how well a particular policy or programme has been implemented and how appropriate the actual policy approach is, and for whom? (Bishwakarma et al., 2007, p. 39; Hankivsky, 2012b).
Despite the rapid spread of Housing First and associated services, no single policy initiative will be appropriate for all people who experience homelessness. Policy evaluations can identify which approach is most effective and for whom. What is to be evaluated, by whom, when and how, is ideally decided during the policy formulation stage (Carson and Kerr, 2014, p. 89). However, policy and programme evaluation is often an ‘after thought’ and rarely includes service user-led evaluations (Coltman et al., 2015).
There have been numerous quantitative and qualitative evaluations of Housing First, including in the field of social work, that intersect predetermined variables, such as substance abuse and mental illness with housing success (Tsemberis and Eisenberg, 2000; Culhane et al., 2002; Padgett et al., 2006; 2011). Over 40 cities across America have now demonstrated cost savings using Housing First (Stanhope and Dunn, 2011). In addition to being the ‘most cost-effective’, Housing First approaches are promoted as the ‘most humane approach of providing housing’ (Culhane, 2008; McLaughlin, 2011, p. 410). Social work research has documented the subjective experiences and voices of service users and providers in these homelessness programmes (Padgett, 2007; Padgett et al., 2008; Padgett et al., 2011). However, Stanhope and Dunn (2011) note that Housing First was compelling to conservative governments because of the reductionist, narrow and de-contextualised nature of positivist research evaluations that reflected residual approaches to social welfare in the US and the UK (Esping-Anderson, 1990). The evaluations categorised, identified specific needs, and calculated financial costs of not addressing these needs (Stanhope and Dunn, 2011). However, they did not examine intersecting power relations and social inequalities that contributed to and maintained homelessness. Furthermore, the main implementation challenges for most Housing First projects in Europe continue to involve ‘securing rapid access to housing’, long waiting lists for social housing and overcoming ‘stigmatisation, social isolation, poverty and unemployment’ (Busch-Geertsema, 2014, p. 25).
Nonetheless, positive programme and research innovations have emerged from Housing First homelessness policy developments, that include inclusive and participatory approaches, such as service user-led evaluations in Canada (Coltman et al., 2015). The Toronto Housing First site houses people with a mental illness and works collaboratively with ‘The People With Lived Experience Caucus’, to provide a lived experience perspective and advice to the service, by people who have experienced homelessness and used the mental health system (Coltman et al., 2015). This research is discussed in greater depth in Chapter 6.
Furthermore, Fischer (2003) proposes that policy analysts are potentially facilitators of inclusive policy making, if the production of knowledge becomes accessible to all. Thus, citizen inquiries can provide alternative evaluations of homelessness policy. That is, citizens can identify their ‘own interests, reframe arguments, make their own decisions’, deconstruct policy arguments and highlight relationships of power (Stanhope and Dunn, 2011, p. 281). This participatory style of policy analysis asks the question: What is good for democratic society? (Mayer et al., 2004). In the field of disability, for example, Meekosha (2006) argued that feminist intersectional activists have failed to examine citizenship and disability. She provided an analysis of race, ethnicity, gender and disability, drawing attention to the power of the social processes of naming and classifying ‘who does and who does not constitute a full citizen’, in regards to the intersecting social constructions of exclusion based on disability (Meekosha, 2006, p. 172). Alternative policy articulations focusing on an inclusionary citizenship (Lister, 2003) promotes participatory access to all citizens, regardless of ability, race, gender, religious affiliation and socio-economic status. When considering an intersectional social work approach, participatory and service user-led evaluations can enhance social work practice and policy responses to homelessness.
With the intent to institutionalise intersectional policy responses and to address diverse and intersecting discriminations, Hankivsky and Cormier (2011) endorse Parken’s (2010) Multi-Strand Method as an example of an innovative intersectional policy-making process, which emphasises multiple inequalities. The Multi-Strand Project (Parken and Young, 2007; 2008; Parken, 2010) was developed in the UK in the context of Article 13 of the EU Treaty of Amsterdam (1999), which necessitates that member states must protect citizens from discrimination on ‘a number of grounds including gender, race or ethnic origin, religion or belief, disability, age, and sexual orientation’ (Hankivsky and Cormier, 2011, p. 223). In 2006, the United Kingdom passed the Equality Act and in 2007 set up the Equality and Human Rights Commission, to oversee ‘a full spectrum of inequalities’ (Hankivsky and Cormier, 2011, p. 223).The Multi-Strand Project responds to the ‘six-strand’ equality legislation, which covers gender, disability, race, sexual orientation, age and religion. Hankivsky and Cormier (2011, p. 220) argued that the UK is ‘prompting progressive work to develop policy models that are able to address multiple grounds of inequality’. These policy developments that intersect inequalities can potentially involve social workers and also inform policy responses to homelessness.
Hankivsky and Cormier (2011, p. 224) discuss the following four distinct stages of the Multi-Strand Model in great depth: mapping, visioning, road testing and monitoring, and evaluation. This ‘equality mainstreaming’ process commences with an Evidence Panel of ‘experts’ (potentially including service users) from key organisations with human rights, equality and policy knowledge, and a vested interest in one or more strands. First, the mapping process involves scrutinising the policy field (such as social care), and asking questions, such as
Who is it for? What are the intended outcomes? How is the field structured to perpetuate disadvantage? Does the field promote values of dignity, respect and autonomy? How does the policy operate? What are the human right areas? and Who are the stakeholders?
(Parken and Young, 2007; Hankivsky and Cormier, 2011, p. 224)
Next, the mapping also involves gathering information (such as qualitative and quantitative research data from secondary sources), examining current policies and reviewing previous research findings about each equality strand, within the field of social care. The mapped information is then collated into ‘vision’ changes for the government/s and service provider implementation, and is ‘road tested’ in diverse scenarios. For example, will the policy work for a gay disabled man living in a rural area, as well as an Indian single mother on a low income? What services need to be in place to enable access? This mapping involves consultation with a diverse range of stakeholders, including service providers, service users, activist and interested groups, about whether changes will have the ‘intended benefits’ (Parken and Young, 2007; 2008; Hankivsky and Cormier, 2011, p. 224). The last stage, ‘monitoring and evaluation’, sets equality and human rights outcomes, provides criteria for ‘inspectors’ who will monitor the achievement of these targets, develops a strategy for the continuing monitoring of achievements, and reviews and changes policies within ongoing feedback loops (Parken and Young, 2007; 2008; Hankivsky and Cormier, 2011, p. 224).
The multi-strand UK intersectional approach connects social policy to diversity, equality and human rights initiatives, focusing on macro (structural) as well as micro (everyday) social change. Murphy et al. (2009, p. 62) also call for the examination of interconnecting and reinforcing power relations at the macro (social structures), mezzo (institutions and organisations) and micro (everyday interaction) levels, at different stages of policy making. Consideration of these multilayered macro-mezzo-micro practices that contribute to enhancing social justice and reducing inequalities, are particularly relevant to social work practice. As May (2015, p. vii) notes, an intersectional approach includes ‘unsettling’ dominant assumptions, examining gaps and silences and rethinking ‘how we approach liberation politics.’ This emancipatory way of thinking can also apply to social work responses to homelessness. Future directions in homelessness policy making can include intersectional theorising that incorporates an analysis of power relations, examines social justice ethics and principles, acknowledges changing social contexts, geographical locations and diverse service user perspectives, and promotes inclusive and collaborative policy, research and practice.
Policy makers and researchers (including social workers) are involved in advocating for challenging injustices and negotiating meanings with decision makers and others stakeholders in the policy-making process, such as service providers and service users. This includes collaboratively defining the problem (such as homelessness), setting the policy agenda, adopting, implementing, delivering and evaluating policy (Murphy et al., 2009, pp. 59–60). Social workers play an important role in advocating for policy, system and social change, to prevent and end homelessness, and to intervene to assist people who are at risk of and are experiencing homelessness.
The social work purpose involves advocating for making visible intersecting inequalities, even within conservative political contexts that continue to uphold the status quo. Social workers can be involved in: challenging intersecting and disadvantaging categorisations of people (including making visible the diversity of people labelled as ‘the homeless’); naming the disempowering effects of social policies, such as on Indigenous communities that have contributed to experiences of ‘spiritual homelessness’ (Keys Young, 1998); highlighting intersecting inequalities that act as structural barriers to accessing housing; and making visible diverse definitions of home and homelessness, by noting missing voices in social policy development and analysis.
Housing is a basic human right. Responding to human rights violations, the social inclusion of refugees, asylum seekers and cross country migrants are major global policy issues. Depending on the context of each country, social workers responding to homelessness could be working with Gypsy, Roma and other traveller families and communities, refugees, asylum seekers and forced migrants. Therefore, social work responses to homelessness would incorporate knowledge of civil rights and immigration legislation that focuses on ‘guaranteeing the rights’ of migrants and refugees (Bezunartea-Barrio, 2014, p. 15). However, one of the limitations to making universal claims about human rights and access to housing in responding to homelessness is that policy approaches differ according to localised contexts. For example, one suggestion we made when researching home and homelessness in two remote Australian towns was supporting and resourcing [Indigenous] ‘town camps’, to address the diverse needs of all people in these communities (Zufferey and Chung, 2015, p. 21). However, these suggestions about ‘town camps’ are unlikely to be as relevant in, for example, middle-class urban geographical locations, where there are no ‘town camps’. This highlights how classed and racialised differences shape understandings of homelessness and intersect with remote, rural and/or urban localities (Cloke et al., 2007). A challenge for social work policy makers involves acknowledging complexity, diversity and the intersections between social locations that are both globally and locally relevant (Yuval-Davis, 2006, p. 205).
I have previously argued that policy definitions of homelessness have tended to marginalise diverse understandings of home and homelessness by categorising and homogenising population groups according to housing ‘need’, which can reinforce deep-seated community values that maintain unequal gender, class and racialised power relations (Zufferey, 2015). Social workers, as social actors, are called upon in the social welfare struggle to challenge ‘androcentric’ and sexist interpretations of women’s and men’s needs, and to question how these needs get interpreted (Fraser, 1989, p. 157). An intersectional social work approach takes this further, to explore how gender intersects with classed and racialised power inequalities, to name a few. For example, social work and social policy advocates can highlight the persistence of poverty and how neoliberal welfare states have failed to address ageism, sexism and racism (Adams, 2002; Cunningham and Cunningham, 2012). Therefore, intersectionality can create spaces for policy challenges and social change, which are never fixed and always ‘becoming’ (Bacchi and Eveline, 2010). However, social policies themselves are also gendering, racialising, heteronorming, classing, disabling and third-world-making practices that have constitutive, discursive, subjectification and lived experience effects on people governed by these policies (Bacchi, 1999; 2009).
In this chapter, I have shown how the Intersectionality-Based Policy Analysis framework (IBPA) is useful to explore the ‘doing’ of intersectionality in policy research, activism and practice (Hankivsky, 2012b, pp. 35–38). This policy analysis framework takes into account social justice and intersecting factors that constitute social inequalities, advocates for self-reflexivity and gives voice to diverse knowledge/s. Intersectional analyses can focus on the policy-making process, outcomes of policies and on the privileges of the policy maker. However, the challenging aspect of an intersectional analysis approach is for social workers to examine policy ideas as problem representations and to reflect on their origins, purposes and effects (Bacchi, 2009). This reflexivity acknowledges that social workers are immersed in constructing as well as resisting dominant policy representations. To subject representations of ‘social problems’ such as homelessness to critical analyses involves examining deeply ingrained assumptions in Western culture, from which no-one is exempt (Bacchi, 2009, p. xix). As social workers, it is important to interrogate our own assumptions about homelessness and ‘homeless people’ as well as reflect on our own social locations. In the next chapter I further discuss social work practices in the field of homelessness, from this reflexive intersectional social work approach.
Note
1Hankivsky (2012b) notes that the IBPA questions have been informed by a diverse range of authors, including Abelson et al. (2008), Bacchi (1999), Hancock (2007), Hankivsky and Cormier (2009), Harris et al. (2007), Parken (2010), Parken and Young (2007), Signal et al. (2008), Urbanek (2009) and Weber and Parra-Medina (2003).
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