Tenant participation to enable the experience of home in social housing

Abstract

Tenant participation in social housing is recognised as integral to good governance and has been incorporated in formal policy across many Western countries. While tenant participation has much intuitive appeal and is often viewed as a good thing of itself, there is limited empirical knowledge of the value it holds or why it should be progressed. This study contributes to contemporary research on tenant participation in social housing—including how it is experienced by tenants themselves—by analysing why tenant participation is important. Drawing on a participatory research design co-conducted and co-authored with social housing tenants, we collected and analysed ethnographic observations of tenant participation activities, semi-structured interviews with social housing tenants and social housing providers, and tenant survey data. Drawing on this rich data, we demonstrate that tenant participation is valuable as it constitutes a vehicle to contribute to tenants experiencing home.