Abstract

This paper is about what people conceive as just principles for the distribution of open space maintenance. Housing staff and residents' conceptions of just distribution of open space maintenance were studied in rental housing areas with large green open spaces in Sweden. Qualitative interviews with nine housing staff members and 27 tenants in three multi-family housing areas owned and managed by different municipal housing companies revealed widely varying conceptions. These could be partly classified into three basic principles: equal outcome, same inputs and less inputs (when decline is high). The conceptions varied among interviewees with different roles in providing upkeep, suggesting that they partly depended on the individual's insight into the services. These personal conceptions of justice influence how people experience service distribution in a neighbourhood and pose a challenge for actors dealing with strategic decisions on open space maintenance.

Keywords

Conceptions; Housing; Justice; Open space maintenance; Service distribution

Published in

Journal of Housing and the Built Environment
2011, volume: 26, number: 1, pages: 17-32
Publisher: SPRINGER

Authors' information