Housing in the Philippines

Human Rights Dialogue 1.11 (Summer 1998) "Toward a "Social Foreign Policy" with
Asia"
CORAZON SOLIMAN, SHYAMA VENKATESWAR | JUNE 5, 1998
The following is a summary of the breakout group on housing, as reported by
Shyama Venkateswar, Carnegie Council on Ethics and International Affairs

Moderator Corazon Soliman (Community Organization Training and Research

Advocacy Institute) initiated the discussion by asking the American and Asian
participants to share their views on what they felt were some of the barriers to
adequate housing for citizens on both sides of the Pacific. Although the participants
represented countries with different levels of economic development and political
regime types, they agreed on the existence of a common set of barriers.

In the United States as well as in Asian countries, a major issue is the scarcity of
affordable housing and access to credit. Even when housing is available, the
prohibitive costs of renting or purchasing and the lack of easy access to mortgage
or lending systems place decent housing beyond the reach of ordinary citizens.

A second barrier is the insecurity of tenure and property rights. Both Soliman and
Kenneth Fernandes (Asian Coalition for Housing Rights) raised the issue of how in
Southeast Asia the lack of secure titles and the prevalence of informal ties to land
often result in eviction. Without proper documentation of ownership, those evicted,
usually the poor and the marginalized, have no recourse to the law.

The American participants were divided over the value of having property rights set
within a clearly defined legal system. While some participants commented that a
tight legal structure was simply a way to tax and charge citizens during the transfer

of property or the closing of a transaction, others, like Harold O. Wilson (Local

Initiatives Support Corporation) argued that a formal legal structure supported by
the state was necessary in order for the state to provide affordable housing to lowincome groups.

This led to a discussion of a third category of barriers connected to the role of

government: overregulation and bureaucratic rigidity. Some participants expressed
the need for government involvement in the provision of infrastructural necessities
like sewage, water, and the like; others argued that the involvement of government
often led to abuse and corruption. Participants from the United States and Asia
identified instances where government involvement often hurt ordinary citizens.
Wilson gave an example of communities on the U.S.-Mexico border that are unable
to afford to build their houses because of the stringency of building codes in the
area. As an example of bureaucratic rigidity in Asia, Fernandes mentioned that
many of the standards in place in Asian countries are designed by Western-trained
bureaucrats and planners, who appropriate laws that are wholly incompatible with
local conditions. Fernandes brought up the case of Karachi, another example of
government involvement, where only 5 to 8 percent of the government-sponsored
housing projects were occupied by low-income groups, with the rest occupied by
middle-income groups who bought their property on speculation.

Class, race, age, and gender discrimination pose another set of barriers. Tom Jones
(Habitat for Humanity International) noted that even in the United States, where
there is a willingness to help find affordable housing for people of different cultures,
races, and classes, there is still a general attitude of NIMBY (not in my backyard). In
other words, supporting the idea of housing for all is fine in theory, but it is difficult
to implement such plans. People are reluctant to integrate and share neighborhoods
with those from different socioeconomic and racial backgrounds.

The group turned to the question of finding common solutions for the housing crisis
on both sides of the Pacific, and specifically to the means of providing affordable
housing for all citizens in both rural and urban communities. A common thread was
the need to empower ordinary citizens by organizing them, thereby giving them the
opportunity to engage with policymakers and planners in decisions regarding their
neighborhoods and communities. Lawrence Chickering (International Center for
Economic Growth) gave examples of housing initiatives that his organization has led
in California. By organizing tenants to create self-governed organizations in public
housing projects, the NGO was able to turn dysfunctional crime-ridden communities
into productive communities with less crime and fewer racial tensions.

Citing another example, Wilson described a successful initiative in Honduras in the

1960s. A housing foundation started giving small, starter loans to squatter
communities with the stipulation that the loans be repaid. The foundation also help
form cooperatives, NGOs, and credit unions to serve those particular areas of the
community. The key, according to Wilson, was organizing communities. Once that
had been achieved, the loans were repaid, and soon afterward the shanty towns
constructed from cardboard had been replaced by concrete and cement structures.

Soliman asserted that it is important for Asians and Americans to work with their
governments in planning and developing communities. She gave the example of the
Philippines, where NGO groups advocating for housing rights actively search out
planners and technocrats to elicit from them ideas about how to develop
communities. She cited a land-sharing agreement in Bangkok, in which slum
dwellers had negotiated with the government and the monarch to divide the land on
which they squatted; a portion of it was used by the crown property to build
commercial buildings where business was conducted, and the rest was used by the
people to design houses for themselves. Institutionalizing that kind of interaction,
Soliman argued, helps cities to move in the direction of being people-owned
rather than planner-owned or government-owned. However, she cautioned that
these attempts in Asia tend to be more successful in secondary cities, as opposed to
megacities like Metro Manila and Bangkok.

All the participants agreed that this work could not be accomplished by the NGO
and nonprofit communities alone. It is essential that local community organizations
and housing advocacy groups work in close cooperation with the relevant branches
of government to find solutions to the housing crisis and to build sustainable
communities. Jones and Fernandes offered concrete examples of such successful
collaborations in the United States and in Cambodia, respectively.

Although ownership is construed in different waysin the United States, in a legal

manner and in Asia, more informallythe participants stressed that giving people
property rights and secure titles to land would result in their being able to use the
property as collateral, to invest time and energy in their communities, and to
become politically active in demanding local schools, roads, and hospitals. In their
personal experiences, these participants had found that providing secure titles and
soft loans motivated people to create and build their communities according to their
own definition of quality of life rather than that of government bureaucrats and elite
planners.

The group also discussed the role of intermediary institutions like the U.S.
community development corporations (CDCs) at the community, city, and
international levels that determine policies in cooperation with city planners. In this
context, the participants noted the value of intermediary national-level groups that
help to aggregate resources for community-based organizations and train them in
advocacy. By amassing funds for low-income and disenfranchised people and
bringing together those who own capital and those who own land, CDCs help people
to build their houses, organize, and empower themselves. Wilson brought up the
Self-Help Housing Program as a model in place in rural America. Under this program,
the Department of Agriculture makes grants to CDCs to organize families to
construct their own houses through low-interest loans.

Underlying the discussion of barriers and solutions to the housing problem is the
notion that housing is not simply a matter of building concrete structures or
infrastructure, but is intrinsically a social and human problem that relates to the
empowerment of local communities. Related to this are two questions on
democratic values: What is the common good and who defines it? What is the
optimal way in which governments can be involved in regulations so that the
common good can be preserved? The idea of people-centered solutions to housing
problems highlights the importance of peoples access to and control of their own
resources, and their ability to participate in larger decision-making processes that
relate to their lives. Finally, building decent homes and communities is strongly
linked to creating economic value for the families living in them. The participants
concurred that focusing on housing development is the first step in generating
economic development in rural and urban areas in the United States and Asia.