Framing degrowth

(Tiny) spaces of hope: Reclaiming, maintaining, and reframing housing in the tiny house movement

“…Despite being effectively forced out of the ‘mainstream’ housing market, our participants acknowledge their comparative privilege in being able to choose a tiny house. Thus, they recognise that these homes presently entrench rather than undermine class relations (Anson, 2018: 69). We have added to existing critical literature on tiny houses by exploring the intersections between our participants’ individual stories and their collective appeal to ways of living that would, if taken up more broadly, dismantle significant portions of the capitalist mode of production.…”

“…Whilst their proliferation on social media might suggest that they are just another hipster trend, in many cases (including those explored in this article), they can also be seen as an inventive play for social and economic change (Colombini, 2019). Nonetheless, their embeddedness within existing socioeconomic relations means that they risk becoming a ‘new and charming exterior for the old politics of class identity’ (Anson, 2018: 69). This suggests the need for greater focus on how the tiny house movement alternately embraces and resists the underlying economic and social relations to which it is subject.…”

“…Solitary tiny housers likewise rely on neighbours, community resources like libraries, and shared land (Anson, 2014). Stories of personal transformation are thus intricately interwoven within people's wider socioeconomic circumstances and beyond (Anson, 2018;Mangold and Zschau, 2019). The tiny house lifestyle is not straightforwardly self-sufficient but facilitated via incursions into the social and physical networks of others who have made different choices (Anson, 2014).…”

Scaling-up degrowth: Re-imagining institutional responses to climate change

“…Additionally, tiny housing could help deconstruct the ‘Build Back Better’ and other disaster-response initiatives by highlighting questions of ecological justice, commodification and access as muted ‘indicators’ in resilience responses. For instance, the Secwepemc peoples’ protest using tiny houses against the Kinder Morgan gas pipeline, as a potential socio-ecological disaster in British Columbia, shows the ecological justice potentials of such degrowth practices (Anson, 2019). Such ‘living indicators’ (Kaika, 2017: 99) highlight broader notions of disaster, its responses and politicisation; practices which are useful to deconstruct mainstream resilience responses.…”

“…Such ‘living indicators’ (Kaika, 2017: 99) highlight broader notions of disaster, its responses and politicisation; practices which are useful to deconstruct mainstream resilience responses. However, if commodified, tiny housing can also mask housing inequality and scarcity or offer another avenue for boutique ruralism, elite environmentalism and privatisation (Alexander et al, 2018; Anson, 2019). Tiny housing practitioners therefore attempt to enact ‘refusal and illegibility’ (Weetman, 2018: 238), by repoliticising housing rights, resource use and exploitation in dominant institutional practices.…”