Document Type : Research Paper
Authors
1 Private Organization/University of Art-Tehran
2 Urban Design Researcher
Abstract
Market-based dynamics have been highly active in the Iranian housing system during the last three decades. One of the inevitable consequences of this dynamic is the commodification of housing. Commodification in return has increased the unaffordability of housing, particularly for low-income households, despite the fact that the housing stock has largely grown. Moreover, market-based forces have participated in the spatial segregation of different social groups during this period.
Theoretically, the involvement of the State in the housing market, for instance through social housing programs, could promote the affordability of the formal market for all and alleviate the social differentiation of society. Maskan-i-Mehr was planned and realized to compensate the failure of the housing market in Iran. But, this social housing program could not counterbalance market-based dynamics. The emergence of many marginalized communities has been a consequence of the program.
The inhabitants of Maskan-i-Mehr are now socially and spatially segregated in a way that they were not before they became Maskan-i-Mehr residents. Most of the residents emigrated from the city to Maskan-i-Mehr in peripheral areas. The marginalization of Maskan-i-Mehr residents has negatively impacted their liveability and social conditions.
By focusing on the Maskan-i-Mehr estates in the new towns of Pardis and Parand, this paper aims to evaluate how the contemporary social housing program in Iran has created a “new social life in new communities”; in other words, how liveability conditions for those who moved to the new communities have, to a large extent, changed.
Keywords
- Market-based Dynamics
- Maskan-i-Mehr Program
- Marginalization
- Social-Spatial Segregation
- Metropolitan Area of Tehran
Main Subjects
)