Sosyal Konut Politikalarını Yeniden Düşünmek: TOKİ Örneği

Since 1960s, developing countries are concerned by the housing problem as a result of ever-increasing urbanization rates and disability of the state and market to shelter disadvantaged population groups. Housing policies and practices that developed through the last 50 years by different governments, evolved around four different inter-dependent concepts: role of state, reaching the poor, scaling up and question of land. Within these 50 years, it is also possible to observe four different stages, primarily defined by the changing role of the state: direct provision of housing through the 60s and 70s, bottom-up practices in the 70s, enablement approach in the 80s and 90s and the contemporary practice started in mid-90s. Closer inspection reveals that government’s role gradually decreased starting from non-conventional bottom-up policies of the 70s up until mid-90s. This caused inability to scale up in the 70s and to reach the poor in the 80s and 90s. Contrary to the previous stages, increased role of state in combination with private sector involvement in the contemporary practice, enabled governments to attain what lacked in previous policies: to address the poorest in scale of need and demand. However, the question of land remained as an unsolved problem through these four stages.

TOKI (Turkish Housing Development Administration), as a single entity in social housing sector in Turkey, sets an interesting example with the dominant role of the Turkish government in social housing provision, similar to conventional housing policies. Commitment of the state, increasing production and centralization of power makes TOKI an intriguing case in the international experience. Private sector involvement -which somehow is limited to fund-raising projects, on the other hand, pulls TOKI away from the conventional practices and places it closer to the contemporary ones. However, limited role of the private sector and its self-financing mechanism detain TOKI to scale up and reach the economically disadvantaged population.

In this dissertation, world practices and TOKI are discussed through the four concepts of housing policies defined above. These discussions reveal how these four concepts are inter-related, how social housing practices evolved around these concepts, and how TOKI places itself closer to the conventional housing practices. Furthermore, by the help of exploration through evolution, it is investigated on strategies of how TOKI can become a more productive institution that could address the poorest on a larger scale.

The overall structure of the study takes the form of four chapters, including this introductory chapter. In the second chapter, evolution of social housing policies and practices are explored in relation to four key concepts: role of state and private sector, reaching the poor, scaling up and question of land. Role of state and private sector is used as a strategical subsection to give brief summary of the evolution by taking advantage of its definitive role of the state at different stages of the housing policies. In the following subsections results of different stages are discussed. In the third chapter, the case of TOKI is analysed while revealing its strengths and shortcomings in comparison to world experience.