Akademik Veri Yönetim Sistemi
Respond Project Symposium: From pandemic to polycrisis - – learning from Covid-19, Kobenhavn, Danimarka, 01 Kasım 2023
Housing emerges as a dependable and almost conventionalized asset – as capital - especially within milieus with turbulent socio-political dynamics. As a residue of the complex urban phenomenon, this entails an array of problems related to the accumulation and redistribution of this "capital". Turkey, as a developing country, is no exception in facing challenges brought about by capital accumulation through housing. The COVID-19 pandemic was, of course, a public trauma for the country, as well as for the rest of the world. During this time, the country was undergoing a continuously deepening economic crisis coupled with an extreme influx of refugees. Furthermore, the country witnessed two extremely shocking earthquakes that affected more than ten cities, causing enormous loss of life. In all honesty, as a peripheral and unstable geography, Turkey witnesses a plethora of natural – earthquakes, scarcity of resources – and synthetic crises – such as economic, social, and political – that collectively and contradictorily operate on the dynamics in the housing field. However, the successive strikes of crisis have exposed problems - even more than the rest of the world - of access to the housing market, particularly for low- and middle-classes, scarcity of housing, squatting, and overloaded infrastructure across the country. Within this scene, Turkey encounters significant challenges in responding to the scarcity of and fair access to housing, developing livable environments, and ensuring safety and security in these settings. Despite vast public investment and singular solutions per crisis, the problems endure due to a lack of a significant agreed-upon common
and broad politics of housing.
This study hypothesizes that this situation widely owes itself to competing and contradicting priorities and accompanying resolution mechanisms of actors and agents of urban housing production. Therefore, it delves into mapping the priorities of different parties to search for common ground. To this end, this work might best be seen as the foundational part of a greater agenda that intends to develop a common language among urban operators. The research builds upon structured in-depth interviews with actors and agents, delving into their priorities within the multi-crises scene, as well as an investigation of the legislative framework. A consistent mapping of the viewpoints is likely to indicate potential points of origin for developing alternative means of housing supply with improved codes of planning and architecture.