Squatting and the State: Resilient Property in an Age of Crisis

by Lorna Fox O'Mahony, Marc L. Roark

Overview

Squatting and the State offers a new theoretical and methodological approach for analyzing state response to squatting, homelessness, empty land, and housing. Embedded in local, national, and transnational contexts, and reaching beyond conventional property theories, this important work sets out a fresh analytical paradigm for understanding the deep, interlocking problems facing not just the traditional 'victims' of narratives about homelessness and squatting but also a variety of other participants in these conflicts. Against the backdrop of economic, social, and political crises, Squatting and the State offers readers important insights about the changing natures of property, investment, housing, communities, and the multi-level state, and describes the implications of these changes for how we think and talk about property in law.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781108862912
Publisher:	Cambridge University Press
Publication date:	08/25/2022
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	5 MB

About the Author

Lorna Fox O'Mahony is Professor of Law at Essex Law School and Deputy Vice-Chancellor of the University of Essex. Her research explores a wide range of property issues using cross-disciplinary methods. She is author or editor of several books, including Conceptualising Home: Theories, Laws and Policies (2006), which was awarded the Society of Legal Scholars' Birks Prize for Outstanding Legal Scholarship (2007).
Marc Roark is the Louisiana Outside Counsel of Health and Ethics Endowed Professor of Law at the Southern University Law Center. His is also a Senior Fellow at the Native American Law and Policy Institute at Southern University. He has published widely on issues at the intersection of property, housing, homelessness and identity. He is a member of the EVICT research network and serves on the Advisory Panel for the UNESCO Housing Chair at the Universität Rovira I Virgilli, Tarragona, Spain.

Table of Contents

Introduction Squatters, Scale, and the State; Part I. Squatting and the State: 1. States, narratives, and norms; 2. Squatting and the law; 3. Property theory and the state; 4. Scaling the state; Part II. Resilient Property in an Age of Crises: 5. Resilient property methodology; 6. Possession, pragmatism, and homeless squatting; 7. Ownership and absent owners; 8. Aggregate interests – neighborhoods, markets, and social movements; Part III. Resilient Property in Action: 9. Scaling resilience and the state; 10. Postscript: Resilient property and the pandemic; Bibliography; Index.

Editorial Reviews

‘This timely and important book compels us to rethink how law structures property relations between individuals, institutions, and the state. It is a must-read for anyone interested in reforming property law to be more responsive to our collective human need for resilience.’ Martha Albertson Fineman, Robert W Woodruff Professor of Law, Emory University, Founding Director of the Vulnerability and the Human Condition Initiative

‘With the unfurling of seemingly perpetual socio-economic, health, and ecological crises destabilizing long-held conceptions of law, property theory is overdue for a reckoning with the imbrication of the state’s vulnerability and property’s role in individual and institutional resilience. Fox O'Mahony and Roark’s erudite and innovative guide to an emerging world offers a force and moral clarity that demand recognition.’ Nestor M. Davidson, Albert A. Walsh Professor of Real Estate, Land Use and Property Law, Urban Law Center, Fordham Law School

‘The authors have produced a monumental contribution to property theory. States should draw inspiration from this monograph as they respond to the polycentric demands of housing crises at multiple levels using an array of resources. Resilience thinking and adaptability will become the baseline in housing scholarship for years to come.’ Gustav Muller, Associate Professor of Private Law, University of Pretoria

From the Publisher