Suchergebnisse

In the last few decades, urban renewal policies have taken firm root in many Western European countries. Underlying these renewal policies is a strong belief in negative neighborhood effects of living in poverty concentration areas, often neighborhoods with a large share of social housing. In Europe, great importance is attached to creating a more diverse housing stock (in terms of tenure and dwelling types) and as a means to establish a more socially mixed neighborhood population. Mixed housing strategies are stated explicitly by governments in the Netherlands, the United Kingdom, Germany, France, Finland and Sweden. The idea is that mixing homeowners with social renters will create a more diverse socio-economic mix in neighborhoods, removing the potential of negative neighborhood effects. By far the largest tenure mix operation in Europe is the Right to Buy (RTB) scheme in the United Kingdom. Since the 1970s, over 2.7 million social rented houses have been sold with large discounts, mainly to sitting tenants. In this paper we synthesize the outcomes of RTB with regard to neighborhood impacts: residualisation, neighborhood stability, tenure mix and social mix, social interactions, and dwelling maintenance. Although we acknowledge substantial socioeconomic benefits of the RTB for many individual residents, we find that the neighborhood outcomes of RTB are by no means solely beneficial.

PurposeCommunity-based social enterprises (CBSEs), a spatially defined subset of social enterprise, are independent, not-for-profit organisations managed by community members and committed to delivering long-term benefits to local people. CBSEs respond to austerity and policy reforms by providing services, jobs and other amenities for residents in deprived communities, thus contributing to neighbourhood regeneration. This paper aims to develop a better understanding of how CBSEs perceive accountability, how they apply it in the management and representation of their business and why.Design/methodology/approachNine case studies of CBSEs across three European countries (England, the Netherlands and Sweden) are analysed, using data from semi-structured interviews with initiators, board members and volunteers in CBSEs.FindingsCBSEs shape accountability and representation in response to the needs of local communities and in the wake of day-to-day challenges and opportunities. Apart from financial reporting, CBSEs apply informal strategies of accountability which are highly embedded in their way of working and contingent upon their limited resources.Originality/valueAlthough research has shown the complex governance position of CBSEs, their application of accountability to target communities and other stakeholders is unclear. The paper coins the term "adaptive accountability," reflecting a relational, dialectic approach in which formal, costly accountability methods are only applied to legally required forms of accounting, and informal practices are accepted by funding agencies and governments as valid forms of accountability, assessing CBSEs' societal value in more open terms.