Evictions

NEW YORK TIMES BESTSELLER • WINNER OF THE PULITZER PRIZE • NAMED ONE OF TIME’S TEN BEST NONFICTION BOOKS OF THE DECADE • One of the most acclaimed books of our time, this modern classic “has set a new standard for reporting on poverty” (Barbara Ehrenreich, The New York Times Book Review). In Evicted, Princeton sociologist and MacArthur “Genius” Matthew Desmond follows eight families in Milwaukee as they each struggle to keep a roof over their heads. Hailed as “wrenching and revelatory” (The Nation), “vivid and unsettling” (New York Review of Books), Evicted transforms our understanding of poverty and economic exploitation while providing fresh ideas for solving one of twenty-first-century America’s most devastating problems. Its unforgettable scenes of hope and loss remind us of the centrality of home, without which nothing else is possible. NAMED ONE OF THE BEST BOOKS OF THE YEAR BY President Barack Obama • The New York Times Book Review • The Boston Globe • The Washington Post • NPR • Entertainment Weekly • The New Yorker • Bloomberg • Esquire • BuzzFeed • Fortune • San Francisco Chronicle • Milwaukee Journal Sentinel • St. Louis Post-Dispatch • Politico • The Week • Chicago Public Library • BookPage • Kirkus Reviews • Library Journal • Publishers Weekly • Booklist • Shelf Awareness WINNER OF: The National Book Critics Circle Award for Nonfiction • The PEN/John Kenneth Galbraith Award for Nonfiction • The Andrew Carnegie Medal for Excellence in Nonfiction • The Hillman Prize for Book Journalism • The PEN/New England Award • The Chicago Tribune Heartland Prize FINALIST FOR THE LOS ANGELES TIMES BOOK PRIZE AND THE KIRKUS PRIZE “Evicted stands among the very best of the social justice books.”—Ann Patchett, author of Bel Canto and Commonwealth “Gripping and moving—tragic, too.”—Jesmyn Ward, author of Salvage the Bones “Evicted is that rare work that has something genuinely new to say about poverty.”—San Francisco Chronicle

Every year, Jakarta's security forces demolish the homes of thousands of people and destroy the residents' personal property. These evictions are carried out with little notice, due process, or compensation. Far too often, the process involves excessive use of force against those facing eviction. Many thousands more of Jakarta's poor live in fear that one day the bulldozers will arrive at their community. Forced evictions--the removal of people against their will from the homes and land they occupy, without access to legal and other protections--deprive individuals of some of their most fundamental human rights and needs: adequate housing and protection of their homes. Based on more than one hundred interviews, Condemned Communities documents the human rights consequences of evictions being carried out by the Jakarta regional government. In some cases the land is being claimed for infrastructure projects, while in other instances the government attempts to justify the forced evictions in the name of public order and removing trespassers. Yet many of the condemned communities have lived on the land for years or even generations. Many evictions can be seen as part of a wider government pattern to intimidate the urban poor and deter urban migration. This report illustrates that, far from improving the quality of life in Jakarta, the forced eviction of communities succeeds only in moving the problem to other parts of the city at great human cost.

Evictions in the UK examines the relationships between tenants, landlords, housing providers and government agencies and the tensions and conflicts that characterise these relations. The book shows how power dynamics are being reconfigured in the post-welfare context of the first quarter of the 21st century, as evictions for rent arrears are becoming one of the most significant threats to both the wellbeing of the social housing sector and the welfare of its tenants. Embracing both practical and critical approaches, this book offers a comprehensive understanding of the contradictory and thus controversial issue of evictions. It explores the range of perspectives involved in the practice – landlords carrying out evictions, those agencies providing legal assistance to evictees, as well as academics and institutions charged with researching and regulating the process. Drawing on three case studies relating to evictions across Scotland and England, this book provides a comprehensive look at the punitive consequences of poverty (evictions for rent arrears) and status (evictions under immigration law) that are applicable to social housing systems worldwide. Based on original, primary-source data, this book will be a key resource for academics and students as well as policy makers and practitioners in the fields of housing studies, planning, social welfare, and political sociology.

The loss of a home can lead to major violations of a person’s dignity and human rights. Yet, evictions take place everyday in all countries across Europe. This book provides a comparative assessment of human rights, administrative, procedural and public policy norms, in the context of eviction, across a number of European jurisdictions. Through this comparison the book exposes the emergence of consistent, Europe-wide standards and norms.

Evictions and the Right to Housing: Experience from Canada, Chile, the Dominican Republic, South Africa, and South Korea