Future sustainability for housing development : an eco-modernist and a degrowth scenario ; Framtidig bærekraft som premiss for boligutvikling : et øko-modernistisk scenario og et motvekst-scenario

This thesis is mainly concerned with the environmental and social sustainability of housing development in affluent countries using Oslo and Milan as case studies. It aims to investigate alternative housing futures that can provide secure access to adequate housing, equal distribution and environmental sustainability. It contributes to the housing debate by suggesting the reorientation of the housing sustainability field towards integrating the social and environmental domains. This is because it finds an important gap in housing research concerning the lack of integration of the two domains and the need for more interdisciplinarity in housing research and practice. Based on these interdisciplinarity and normative goals, this study employs two theoretical paradigms to address and design two alternative future scenarios for the housing sector in affluent Western countries and applies them in the cases of Oslo and Milan in 2030. Furthermore, this study applies ecological modernisation and degrowth as societal paradigms to investigate the future housing development meeting the normative conditions. These two theories are normatively laden and offer an interesting base for designing future scenarios for housing development following both environmental and social sustainability. Ecological modernisation considers economic growth a lever for increasing sustainability and addresses it by proposing decoupling measures to soothe the environmental impacts emerging from growth. Degrowth represents what scholars have defined as a 'voluntary, smooth and equitable transition into a regime of lower production and consumption’ (Schneider et al., 2010). Both future scenarios acknowledge environmental limits and consider social justice to avoid the environmental degradation and aggravated inequality that the current ‘pro-growth housing system’ entails. This study builds on different steps with different methods and techniques. Thus, the project applies a mixed-method approach to ascertain the different research questions. The ...