Bridging Research on Care and Housing

An International Conference of the DOC-team 114 in Cooperation with the International Karl Polanyi Society, the Competence Centre for Infrastructure Economics, Public Services and Social Provisioning, Center for Interdisciplinary Research on Aging and Care, and Sorgenetz, Association for the Promotion of Societal Care Culture. Life, Old Age, Dementia and Dying at the Johannes Kepler University Linz, 4th - 6th December 2023.

The conference aims at addressing the following questions with the explicit intention of using multiple theoretical perspectives and to grasp the broad diversity of European countries, regions, and cities:

• What are the driving forces of transformative change in the fields of care and housing? Which social, economic, political, cultural, and technological dynamics and which norms and values, demands and claims shape modes of care and housing provision?

• How do markets, the state, the family and the community reorganise care and housing? What are other key actors in different institutional contexts at multiple levels (from local to global)?

• Which disputes take place in “doing care” and “doing housing”? How do these relate to multi-scalar struggles over working conditions, wages, and affordability as well as the design of liveable neighbourhoods?

• What are relevant economic and political orders, welfare regimes, and social policies and how do they structure different forms of care and housing provision?

• How do new modes, forms, and arrangements of care and housing provision promote a different understanding of life and work? How are they interrelated with the reorganisation of paid, unpaid and volunteer, professional and lay work and new forms of work organisation?

• How are modes of care and housing provision and the transformative change in the configuration of care and housing affected by the development and implementation of digital technologies? How does technological change influence the meaning and organisation of care and housing?

• How are modes of care and housing provision and the transformative change in the configuration of care and housing affected by the climate crisis? How does it contribute to changes in the governance of communities, neighbourhoods, and the living environment to reconfigure care and housing provision?

• How do social, economic, gendered, and ethnic inequalities and socio-spatial polarisations shape the organisation of care and housing? How do they affect transformative change, social and ecological demands, and digitalisation of care and housing arrangements?

• What are the commonalities and differences in the provision of care and housing? How can theoretical and methodological approaches contribute to a better understanding of care and housing in Europe? What are the potentials and limitations of approaches that integrate both fields?

Organizers and chairs:
Brigitte Aulenbacher Andreas Novy
Valentin Fröhlich Benjamin Baumgartner
Florian Pimminger Hans Volmary

Conference assistance:
Alexander Eigner

Administration:
Tobias Eder

Aufgezeichnet am 5. Dezember 2023