Too poor to get social housing?

Can you be too poor to get social housing? In a paper called "Too poor to get social housing: Accounting and structural stigmatisation of the poor" (1), researchers Aziza Laguecir and Bryant Ashley Hudson analyze the role accounting plays in the stigmatisation of the poorest applicants. Intrigued by the fact that the most disadvantaged populations have very limited access to social housing in France, they sought to understand why. What they discovered is the role played by the Performance Measurement and Management Accounting Systems (PMS and MAS), as a way to reproduce the stigmatisation of the underprivileged.

The paradox of French social housing

Some studies have shown that the people whom social housing is meant to serve are also the people who struggle to access it. For instance, a report jointly commissioned by six French NGOs outlined the difficulties of access to social housing (2), showing that very low-income households fail to have access to it: ‘In high-tension areas, people living in poverty or extreme poverty account for 41% of social housing applicants, but they only receive 35% of allocations. As a result, the majority of these families are housed in the private sector, often in dilapidated and overcrowded conditions and with unsustainable housing costs’. This paradox in French social housing needed to be explored.

In their paper, Aziza Laguecir and Bryant Ashley Hudson showed that the social housing sector has been facing increasing institutional pressures for financial performance, with emphasis on cash flow and cost saving. Decades of New Public Management reforms promoted a market orientation in the sector, notably through private-sector-inspired accounting methods. This has contributed to a change in the nature of social housing organisations and their accountability processes. Obviously, this economic performance-oriented model affects every line of business and is not exclusive to social housing.

However, there are actual adverse consequences, such as the stigmatisation of the most vulnerable, which in turn entails their limited access to social and affordable housing.

The researchers discovered that this process of stigmatisation was not isolated at a micro-level but connected to a broader context of institutional policies and socio-cultural norms.

What is stigma?

Stigma can be described as a set of negative and unfair beliefs about someone or something. The Canadian-American sociologist Erving Goffman defined stigma as a “discrediting” and “undesired differentness,” placing the individual in a situation where they are “disqualified from full social acceptance.” From his perspective, stigma is a negative judgement of character or worth that attaches to people. The harmful effects of stigma include feelings of shame, isolation, fewer opportunities for employment or social interaction, and reluctance to ask for help.

In their work, Link and Phelan (3) define structural stigma as ‘labelling, stereotyping, separating, status loss, and discrimination co-occurring in a power situation that allows these processes to unfold’. Furthermore, Hatzenbuehler and Link (4) enhanced this definition including ‘societal-level conditions, cultural norms, and institutional policies that constrain the opportunities, resources, and well-being of the stigmatised’.

How accounting shapes and reproduces stigmatisation

Given the housing crisis and the shortage of social dwellings, how does accounting in public social organisations impact the poorest applicants?

This phenomenon has a twofold explanation.

First, accounting participated in the structural stigmatisation of the poorest by reproducing the stigmatisation of the institutional policies at the state and local levels. These state-level funding schemes created a categorisation of the dwelling that led to separating (in categories but also physically) the beneficiaries according to the degree of poverty, negatively labelling and stereotyping them: "bad" behaviour, degraded neighbourhood, crime, etc.

Second, the state governance and the related performance measurement system, combined with sociocultural norms and local policies, strongly shaped the operations surrounding the PMS, particularly the unpaid rent. 

Applicants are classified in two main categories: "good" and "bad" profiles. Different labels were used for the bad profiles, such as big families, the unemployed, and migrants. These were associated with adverse outcomes, notably their ability to pay the rent and the social acceptance of their behaviour. This category was subdivided into two parts: "bad" (unemployed, big families, single-parent families, people with mental disabilities…) and "very bad" (Travellers, people with serious social issues, etc.).

These profiles, associated with low income and undesirable characteristics, were not selected for housing allocation to limit the risk of unpaid rent.

The structural stigmatisation of the poor

Historically, the poor were stigmatised at a structural level, exacerbating inequalities of wealth and opportunities. In this context, accounting is re-producing and reinforcing that stigmatisation. 

Thus, it can be viewed as a stigma machine, with different interconnected components (management accounting and performance measurement systems) working together to amplify, legitimise and reproduce social inequalities.

It is interesting to note that city-level policies also play a role in the stigmatisation of the poorest beneficiaries, by encouraging social mix and allowing urban renewal. This can be explained by the fact that urban renewal allows the removal of the poorest beneficiaries from their dwellings, and the social mix their replacement with more privileged beneficiaries.

Nevertheless, the stigmatisation of the poorest seems to take a different shape than it did in the past. While historically, the impoverished were publicly shamed and disapproved of, in this case, the stigmatisation is less visible, less explicit, and not public. 

Rather than public shame or direct punishment, the poorest are not aware of the nature of the outcomes associated with their stigmatisation. Social housing access denial is never justified: the process aims to protect the landlords and remains invisible to the applicants.

Conclusion

Analysing the role of accounting in the structural stigmatisation of the poorest in social housing sheds light on the structural factors contributing to inequality and discrimination, such as categorisation and performance measurement systems. 

This analysis helps shift the focus from individual responsibility to broader structural norms directly contributing to poverty and housing insecurity.

It is now necessary to call for more inclusive housing policies that empower the underprivileged, rather than stigmatise them. We, as a society, need to understand that poverty stigma only exacerbates high rates of poverty, acting as a glue to hold poverty in place.

Fighting against poverty starts with understanding its structural conditions.

References

(1) Aziza Laguecir, Bryant Ashley Hudson. Too poor to get social housing: Accounting and structural stigmatisation of the poor (2024) Critical Perspectives on Accounting. Volume 100, December 2024, 102757 - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S104523542400056X#s0025

(2) Rapport inter-associatif 2023 : Les difficultés d'accès au logement social des ménages à faibles ressources - https://www.atd-quartmonde.fr/publications/rapport-inter-associatif-sur-les-difficultes-dacces-au-parc-social-des-menages-a-faibles-ressources-dans-la-metropole-du-grand-paris/

(3) Bruce G. Link and Jo C. Phelan. Conceptualizing Stigma (2001). Annual Review of Sociology
Vol. 27 (2001), pp. 363-385 (23 pages) - https://www.jstor.org/stable/2678626

(4) Mark L. Hatzenbuehler, Bruce G. Link. Introduction to the special issue on structural stigma and health (2014). Social Science & Medicine, Volume 103, February 2014, Pages 1-6 - https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0277953613007090

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