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Against the ‘tyranny’ of single-family dwelling: insights from Christiania at 40

2013; Taylor & Francis; Volume: 20; Issue: 8 Linguagem: Inglês

10.1080/0966369x.2012.753583

1360-0524

Helen Jarvis,

Housing, Finance, and Neoliberalism

Ownership of a single-family dwelling remains the dominant aspiration in market-led economies. In a hyper-privatised landscape, it is widely assumed that people will not share housing except in extraordinary circumstances. There is nevertheless a long and rich history of countercultural groups who imagine and practise alternative forms of shared housekeeping and collaborative dwelling. This article draws on first-hand observations of daily life from the countercultural community of Christiania, in the Danish capital of Copenhagen, at a critical moment in a 40-year history of state-threatened 'normalization'. Christiania is an intriguing lens through which to re-imagine affordable, adaptable, gender democratic housing and urban structure: it reveals how sharing, mutuality and innovation intersect at multiple scales of homemaking and community governance. These insights are relevant for provoking new thinking about dwelling and mutuality in the context of a deepening crisis in housing provision and access across Europe.