Mika Ronkainen & Elina Eskelä: Helsinki’s housing policy - A historical overview and the current situation (PDF)
Preface
You are holding an account of the housing policy of Helsinki from the 1940s to this day. It describes the journey of this strongly growing city through different societal seasons of change, including ones that are reflected in housing. On the one hand, this can be seen as going from one housing crisis to another as generations keep solving challenges related to homelessness, housing shortages and equal opportunities to have a good living environment. On the other hand, the account also describes the work and the solutions that have made Helsinki an international paragon in preventing both homelessness and an areal segregation development.
In June 2022, Helsinki will serve as the host city for the International Social Housing Festival. The purpose of this housing policy account is to provide the festival attendees with information about the history and the current state of housing and housing policy in Helsinki, compiled into one publication. However, it also serves as a good reminder to everyone who has worked on the housing conditions of Helsinki of how far we have come, and to us working with housing matters today of what kind of a work heritage we are continuing and why it is important to continue that work in the future.
We would like to give our heartfelt thanks to Mika Ronkainen for writing about the history of housing policy and to Elina Eskelä for writing about the current situation. We would also like to thank the City of Helsinki’s former Housing Programme Manager Mari Randell for guiding and initiating this work.
Helsinki, 20 November 2021
Hanna Dhalmann
Housing Programme Manager
City of Helsinki, publications of the
Central Administration 2022:4
ISBN 978-952-386-053-7 (in print)
ISBN 978-952-386-054-4 (pdf)
ISBN 978-952-386-055-1 (html)
ISSN-L 2242-4504
ISSN 2242-4504 (in print)
ISSN 2323-8135 (online)
Cover image: Jätkäsaari 2021. Antti Pulkkinen
