Search Tips
sorted by
30 shown of 82 entities
Financialization of housing and the right to adequate housing 2017, para. 63
- Paragraph text
- A leading framework for the human rights responsibilities of business enterprises is the Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights: Implementing the United Nations "Protect, Respect and Remedy" Framework. It is grounded in three pillars: (a) the obligation of States to protect against human rights abuses committed by companies; (b) the responsibility of business enterprises to respect human rights, and thus avoid causing or contributing to adverse human rights impacts; and (c) the obligation of States to provide victims with access to effective remedies when rights are breached. A similar framework is applied in the ten principles of the United Nations Global Compact, the first two of which commit businesses to support and respect the protection of internationally proclaimed human rights and to refrain from complicity in human rights abuses. The Principles for Responsible Investment, launched in 2006 by the United Nations Environment Programme Finance Initiative and the Global Compact, provide a voluntary framework for the incorporation of environmental, social and governance issues into decision-making and ownership practices. Over 1,200 investment institutions have become signatories, with approximately US$ 45 trillion assets under management.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Environment
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Financialization of housing and the right to adequate housing 2017, para. 38
- Paragraph text
- Patterns of inequality are often starkest in developing countries. In Africa, if current trends continue, the number of households living in informal settlements will continue to increase while the number of ultra-high-net-worth individuals is predicted to rise by almost 50 per cent in the next decade.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Poverty
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Centrality of the right to adequate housing for the development and implementation of the New Urban Agenda to be adopted at Habitat III in October 2016 2015, para. 70
- Paragraph text
- The Special Rapporteur believes that it is also important to consider various redistributive and cost-recovery mechanisms in cities from a human rights standpoint. Expenditure on public space, infrastructure, recreational facilities and cultural and artistic activities too often benefits more advantaged households to the detriment of the needs of the vast majorities. Pricing of rental housing, water, sanitation and electricity should ensure affordability for low-income households rather than direct cost recovery. Private providers of housing and infrastructure must be regulated in a manner that accords with the fact that, while housing and infrastructure are often treated as commodities, they are fundamental human rights, requiring significant adjustments to prevailing business models. Adjusted pricing of services for low-income households, for example, has been proven to be an efficient business model which at the same time facilitates access to housing, water, sanitation and electricity that might otherwise be denied. Human rights-based tax audits have also been effective in ensuring that revenue collection at the city level is aligned with obligations to apply the maximum of available resources to realize the right to housing.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Water & Sanitation
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2015
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Guiding Principles on security of tenure for the urban poor 2014, para. 21
- Paragraph text
- Hybrid tenure models combine cooperatives and CLTs. Multi-residential buildings are owned and managed by a housing cooperative and the underlying land is owned by the CLT, providing another layer of protection for affordability. The Cooper Square CLT, for example, in New York City holds the land to over 300 low-income housing units in multi-family buildings owned and managed by a mutual housing association.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2014
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 91
- Paragraph text
- At a more fundamental level, there remains a tension between the obligation under international human rights law to confer security of tenure in law and approaches of de facto or administrative recognition. A related question is whether a form of tenure can be secured if not recorded at all.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 78
- Paragraph text
- Public land remains one of the most important potential sources of land for housing the poor, yet there remain obstacles to using public land for such purposes. For instance, poor land governance, corruption in land administration and the tight relationship that exists between tenure status and land values encourages nepotism, corruption, clientelism and market-driven interests in public land allocation.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- All
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 76
- Paragraph text
- Titling is not just a matter of formalizing informal arrangements that already exist. Very often, contradictory claims of ownership arise following the announcements of titling programmes. A related difficulty has been that titling of contested plots involves politically contentious decisions about the allocation of rights and thus is difficult to advance-this is often the case in informal settlements.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 72
- Paragraph text
- A land governance and political economy perspective raises some important questions. Who benefits from the status quo and who is excluded? Who sets the agenda for land governance and land management reform? How are the benefits of reform distributed? These questions cannot be ignored, especially not in a context of rising interest in land and conflicted legal pluralism.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Civil & Political Rights
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 63
- Paragraph text
- While non-discrimination is relevant to all groups and individuals, and all grounds of non-discrimination are potentially relevant to tenure security, the Special Rapporteur focuses here on issues of non-discrimination on account of property status, location and socioeconomic status, which are less often discussed in the human rights framework.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 45
- Paragraph text
- Regional and national case law, global governance frameworks relating to land tenure and human settlements, and selected national constitutional and legislative frameworks were examined in order to supplement an understanding of international human rights law and to assist in identifying potential gaps and challenges.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 44
- Paragraph text
- Security of tenure is recognized as a key component of the right to adequate housing under international human rights law. The Special Rapporteur conducted comprehensive research into the various sources of international human rights law, and especially the authoritive guidance and commentary of United Nations human rights mechanisms, in order to identify States' obligations relating to security of tenure.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 41
- Paragraph text
- As discussed above, tenure categories are often partly formal, recognized or legal, creating shades and combinations of legality, formality and extralegality. The degree of tenure security provided by each of the tenure categories does not always correspond to formalistic or legalistic readings of existing arrangements; rather, it can vary depending on the socioeconomic and political context.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 32
- Paragraph text
- Despite the prevalence of a great variety of tenure systems and arrangements worldwide, in the past few decades, most models of urban planning, land management, development and legal regimes have centred around one particular form: individual freehold. This common fixation on freehold has been supported by the predominant economic doctrine of reliance on private property and market forces.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 27
- Paragraph text
- These broad distinctions are used to clarify the nature of tenure, yet in most cases they simplify and do not fully reflect the complexity of situations on the ground. In many cases legal plurality exists, such as when statutory tenure categories are superimposed upon customary regimes. It might thus be useful to understand the issue as one of a spectrum of tenure arrangements and forms, with marked variations depending on context.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 21
- Paragraph text
- Tenure comes from the French verb tenir, meaning "to hold". A definition that is commonly cited considers land tenure "the relationship, whether legally or customarily defined, among people, as individuals or groups, with respect to land". This definition does not however reflect the realities of informal tenure systems, common in urban areas. The reasons may be that policy development on land tenure has its roots in rural contexts.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Analysis of two alternative housing policies: rental and collective housing 2013, para. 39
- Paragraph text
- Access to urban land for housing, especially serviced land, is one of the major problems faced by developing countries. Informal access to land, increasingly through rental arrangements, is becoming a key form of accessing affordable housing for the poor. A large share of urban landlords in developing countries therefore operate informally in unplanned settlements.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
The right to adequate housing in disaster relief efforts 2011, para. 32
- Paragraph text
- International agencies have shown reluctance to invest in places of return or relocation where land tenure is unclear and where legal and customary arrangements under which claims regarding housing or land may fall are diverse and at times conflicting. In that respect, reconstruction in urban areas might be particularly challenging since the areas they are often characterized by complicated land ownership and tenure issues.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2011
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Guiding Principles on security of tenure for the urban poor 2014, para. 73
- Paragraph text
- Multilateral and bilateral development agencies regularly provide financial and technical assistance to operations that affect tenure security, including infrastructure development; land management, administration and spatial planning; urban development and renewal; settlement upgrading; and policy reforms in, inter alia, the housing and financial sectors. They also provide financing to diverse private sector activities that impact tenure.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2014
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 90
- Paragraph text
- Other forms that had a demonstrated ability to ensure secure tenure in the past, such as tenancy, should also be given renewed attention. Tenancy rates have decreased in many countries, and so has the security associated with them, as seen in some European countries for instance. In other countries, tenancy remains well-established, and in some the role of rental housing is attracting renewed attention, or being used in innovative ways to prevent homelessness.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 89
- Paragraph text
- Questions remain as to the minimum conditions that these approaches should fulfil to ensure security of tenure, what type of institutional arrangements are required for implementation, and whether such approaches can be replicated in diverse contexts and at scale. This is particularly relevant to those forms of tenure that have received less attention and support in research, policy and practice, such as community land trusts, collective tenure models and cooperative ownership.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Financialization of housing and the right to adequate housing 2017, para. 27
- Paragraph text
- Corporate finance does not only profit from inflated prices in hedge cities, it also profits from housing crises. The global financial crisis created unprecedented opportunities for buying distressed housing and real estate debt, which was sold off at fire sale prices in countries such as Ireland, Spain, the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland and the United States of America. The Blackstone Group, the world's largest real estate private equity firm, managing $102 billion worth of property, spent $10 billion to purchase repossessed properties in the United States of America at courthouses and in online auctions following the 2008 financial crisis, emerging as the largest rental landlord in the country. Other major institutional players invested $20 billion to purchase approximately 200,000 single-family homes in the United States between 2012 and mid-2013. With the recovery of the United States housing market, Blackstone and other private equity firms have sought to take advantage of other buying opportunities in Europe and Asia. Cushman and Wakefield estimated that there was over €541 billion of distressed real estate debt in Europe in 2015, much of it held by public asset management companies such as the National Asset Management Agency in Ireland and the Sociedad de Gestión de Activos Procedentes de la Reestructuración Bancaria (company for the management of assets proceeding from the restructuring of the banking system) in Spain. The vast majority of that debt is being purchased by giant private equity firms.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Financialization of housing and the right to adequate housing 2017, para. 9
- Paragraph text
- Constructing human rights accountability within a complex financial system to which Governments are themselves accountable, involving trillions of dollars in assets, may seem a daunting task. However, the global community cannot afford to be cowered by the complexity of financialization. The present report aims to cut through some of the complexity and opaqueness of finance in housing to expose the central relevance and necessity of the human rights paradigm at multiple levels, from the international to the local.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2017
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Responsibilities of local and other subnational governments in relation to the right to adequate housing 2015, para. 14
- Paragraph text
- In unitary States, central governments generally hold primary responsibility for planning, programming, regulation and funding of housing. Mortgage programmes, subsidies, cash transfer programmes and other measures to address lack of housing among vulnerable groups are managed nationally. Those programmes, however, rely on local implementation, allowing varying degrees of autonomy to regions and municipalities/districts or cities.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2015
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Reflection on work undertaken in first 14 years of the mandate; outline of opportunities and priorities 2014, para. 28
- Paragraph text
- Having considered emerging socioeconomic patterns affecting the right to adequate housing, the important work of many stakeholders and developments in the field of economic, social and cultural rights more generally, the Special Rapporteur commences her mandate with an understanding of several key challenges in the implementation of the right to adequate housing, and a recognition of emerging opportunities, that she hopes to address and engage as she undertakes further consultations.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2014
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 9
- Paragraph text
- Self-made and unplanned settlements, with precarious housing conditions, epitomize tenure insecurity in a very visible form. In many cities they now represent the largest single channel of land and housing supply for the majority of the population. Attempts to measure the scale of these settlements and their level of tenure insecurity have been problematic for the reasons just highlighted, and also because of the great diversity in settlements and tenure characteristics across countries and regions.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Analysis of two alternative housing policies: rental and collective housing 2013, para. 56
- Paragraph text
- A community land trust is a form of common land ownership, wherein land is considered to be a commonwealth, and only structures and other improvements are considered private property. Community land trusts aim to remove land from the speculative real estate market; to provide access to land and housing to people who would otherwise be denied access; to expand long-term community control of land resources; and to preserve the affordability of housing permanently.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 77
- Paragraph text
- At a more basic level, land titling is unlikely to address the global needs for increased tenure security within an adequate time frame. In many countries adjudication and registration of freehold land parcels at current rates could take well over a century.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 43
- Paragraph text
- It is thus evident that forms of tenure should more accurately be placed in a multidimensional relationship to one another. And if there is a continuum, it should be seen as going from insecurity to security of tenure, not from informality to formality.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Equality & Inclusion
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 28
- Paragraph text
- The above distinctions have particularly obvious limitations when attempting to capture and reflect the diversity of arrangements in informal tenure systems, or in what is commonly termed "informal settlements".
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph
Mapping and framing security of tenure 2013, para. 22
- Paragraph text
- For the purpose of the present report, and to account for types of tenure in urban contexts, tenure is understood as the set of relationships with respect to housing and land, established through statutory law or customary, informal or hybrid arrangements.
- Body
- Special Rapporteur on adequate housing as a component of the right to an adequate standard of living
- Document type
- Special Procedures' report
- Topic(s)
- Economic Rights
- Governance & Rule of Law
- Social & Cultural Rights
- Person(s) affected
- N.A.
- Year
- 2013
- Date added
- Aug 19, 2019
Paragraph