Third sector housing in 21st-century Hong Kong: opportunities and challenges1

2020 ◽  
Vol 11 (3) ◽  
pp. 337-358
Author(s):  
Betty Yung ◽  
Alex Chan
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
Public Housing ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Social Innovation ◽  
Third Sector ◽  
Housing Provision ◽  
Early 21St Century ◽  
Private And Public ◽  
Housing Needs ◽  
Start Ups

Hong Kong has a large public housing sector that shows strong resilience. Given the approximate half‐half public‐private housing divide in Hong Kong, officials, housing advocates and the general public envisage housing provision, problems and remedies within the ‘rigid’ framework of private and public housing. Social innovation examples of third sector housing as start-ups in ‘social housing’ have emerged in the early 21st century in Hong Kong, thereby forming a ‘new’ model in housing delivery amidst the public‐private binary housing market. This study focuses on the gap filled by third sector housing in Hong Kong through serving as a complement to the private and public housing sectors in meeting unsatisfied general housing needs and as a supplement to both sectors in catering for neglected specialist housing needs. The exact future trajectory of third sector housing development will highly depend on the synergy of different stakeholders in public, private and third sectors as well as the common citizens in its nurturance.

scholarly journals The neuropsychiatric biopolitics of dementia and its ethnicity problem

2021 ◽  
pp. 003802612110599
Author(s):  
James Rupert Fletcher ◽  
Maria Zubair ◽  
Moïse Roche
Keyword(s):  
21St Century ◽  
Care Home ◽  
Medical Model ◽  
Third Sector ◽  
Nursing Support ◽  
Early 21St Century ◽  
Life Itself ◽  
New Type ◽  
Minority Ethnic

Sociological analyses of dementia have long drawn on critiques of medicalisation and the medical model. This approach fails to account for late 20th/early 21st century expansion of neuropsychiatric biopolitics, wherein a more subtle and pervasive (self-)governance of health, illness, and life itself is at stake. Since the 1970s, new neuropsychiatric imaginings of dementia have been promoted, as evident in government, third sector and research trajectories. From the 2000s, engagements with ethnicity have played an increasingly important role in these trajectories. Minority ethnic (ME) populations have emerged as a new type of dementia problem. Observations about diagnosis rates and timings, medication and nursing support (including care home admission) are normatively appraised to associate minority ethnicity with poor dementia outcomes. These outcomes are then attributed to purported cultural shortcomings of these populations. The emergence of (minority) ethnicity as a problem supports a neuropsychiatric biopolitics of dementia, wherein citizens must govern their conduct accordingly so as not to become like the imagined ‘ethnic’ antagonist. Ultimately, dementia’s newfound ethnicity problem may not serve the interests of people affected by dementia so much as researchers in the field, who should therefore reflect on their own contributions.

The Challenge of Poverty, Near-Poverty, and Inequality in 21st-Century Hong Kong

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yue Chim Richard Wong
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
Income Inequality ◽  
Middle Class ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Social Condition ◽  
Early 21St Century ◽  
Property Prices ◽  
Poverty And Inequality ◽  
The World ◽  
Political Problem

The essays in this volume show that poverty, near-poverty, and inequality are multi- faceted conditions. They have coalesced into a growing economic and social condition in Hong Kong, which is also developing into a difficult political problem. The origins can be traced to the effects of economic globalization and China’s opening in the 1980s. It then grew during the late 1990s and worsened in the early 21st century. Many rich cities in the world have experienced similar phenomena. First, a small fraction of the population is in poverty; some may even be destitute. Second, the middle class begins sinking as growing numbers of its members become less able to afford a comfortable life in the manner they are used to. Third, income inequality and inequality in the ownership of wealth rise, especially as a result of escalating property prices. Unlike in other places, in Hong Kong these conditions are developing at a faster pace and with greater severity.

GENEALOGY OF THE LONE PARENT

2010 ◽  
Vol 44 (01) ◽  
pp. 3-16
Author(s):  
KAM WAH CHAN ◽  
FUNG YI CHAN
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
Social Security ◽  
Social Services ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Early 21St Century ◽  
Lone Parent ◽  
Lone Parents ◽  
Lone Mothers ◽  
Social Security Benefits ◽  
The Early 21St Century

Lone parent families are often portrayed as welfare-dependent, and social policies and social services can be hostile to and discriminating against lone parents especially in societies dominated by traditional familism, such as Hong Kong. This resentment of lone parent families has not been present throughout Hong Kong's history, but has arisen over the past decade. This paper is based on a study that traced the changing discourses of the lone parent family in Hong Kong. Adopting the Foucauldian concept of genealogy of knowledge and inspired by Nancy Fraser and Linda Gordon's work on "genealogy of dependency", we trace the discourses of the lone parent family from the 1970s to the early 21st century. The term "lone parent" did not exist before the mid-1980s, and when it first appeared it was closely associated with vulnerability and charity. In the early 21st century, the lone parent discourse developed into a problematic discourse, with lone parents associated with welfare dependency, social security fraud, juvenile delinquency, family violence, and perceived as a threat to social stability. This paper notes that the "success" of this discourse may help to rationalize the cutting back of social security benefits for lone mothers and regulate welfare recipients.

scholarly journals The spatial pattern of premature mortality in Hong Kong: How does it relate to public housing?

Urban Studies ◽  
2016 ◽  
Vol 54 (5) ◽  
pp. 1211-1234 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jens Kandt ◽  
Shu-Sen Chang ◽  
Paul Yip ◽  
Ricky Burdett
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
Public Housing ◽  
Structural Model ◽  
Premature Mortality ◽  
Urban Housing ◽  
Housing Provision ◽  
Negative Effects ◽  
Geographic Variations ◽  
Role Of Government ◽  
Fully Bayesian

Research into understanding the relationship between access to housing, health and wellbeing in cities has yielded mixed evidence to date and has been limited to case studies from Western countries. Many studies appear to highlight the negative effects of public housing in influencing the health of its residents. Current trends in the urban housing markets in cities of advanced Asian economies and debates surrounding the role of government in providing housing underscore the need for more focused research into housing and health. In this paper, we investigate Hong Kong as an example of a thriving Asian city by exploring and comparing the intra-urban geographies of premature mortality and public housing provision in the city. Using a fully Bayesian spatial structural model, we estimate associations between public housing provision and different types of premature mortality. We find significant geographic variations in premature mortality within Hong Kong during the five-year period 2005–2009, with positive associations between the residents of public housing and premature mortality risk. But the associations attenuate or are even reversed for premature mortality of injuries and non-communicable diseases after controlling for local deprivation, housing instability, access to local amenities and other neighbourhood characteristics. The results indicate that public housing may have a protective effect on community health, which contradicts the findings of similar studies carried out in Western cities. We suggest reasons why the association between public housing and health differs in Hong Kong and discuss the implications for housing policy in Hong Kong and other Asian cities.

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