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Contested housing landscapes: deinstitutionalisation, social inclusion and housing policy in Australia

  • Lisa Bostock
    ,
  • Brendan Gleeson
    ,
  • Ailsa McPherson
    ,
  • Lillian Pang
Research Output: Contribution to journal Article Peer-review

Open access

Abstract

Deinstitutionalisation is represented as a major step toward social inclusion through the resettlement of disabled people residing in segregated large-scale institutions into community-based homes. By promoting the right to live in ordinary community residential settings, deinstitutionalisation fundamentally changes both the support services and housing arrangements of former institutional residents. In Australia, as in many Western countries, debates on community care have tended to focus on the location and nature of non-housing supports for people leaving dependent care. This focus, however, overlooks the fact that deinstitutionalisation involves a radical rehousing of people in care. This paper explores the character and implications of deinstitutionalisation in Australia as a rehousing process. It is based on a recent national research project that has examined the housing futures of people with intellectual disability who have been, or will be, deinstitutionalised. The paper considers the increasingly divergent socio-political perspectives that have emerged in recent discussions about social inclusion, institutional reform and independent living and their implications for housing and community care policies.

Publication Information

Output type

Research Output: Contribution to journal Article Peer-review

Original language

English

Pages from-to (Number of pages)

Pages 41-62

Journal (Volume, Issue Number)

Australian Journal of Social Issues (Volume 39, Issue 1)

Publication milestones

  • Accepted/In press - 01/10/2004
  • Published - 22/12/2016

Publication status

Published - 22/12/2016

ISSN

0157-6321

External Publication IDs

  • handle.net: 10547/626017
  • Scopus: 2442520231

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