In Amsterdam, young people face persistent housing difficulties due to soaring house prices and rents, precarious labour conditions, shrinking social housing, and ongoing gentrification. Drawing on 40 in-depth life course interviews, this paper investigates how young people navigate these constraints and how their housing strategies intertwine with other aspects of their lives and existing policies. By combining the Housing Pathway and Capability Approaches, we offer a fresh perspective on the structural and personal factors shaping housing trajectories. Empirically, we conclude that the severity of Amsterdam’s housing problem directly shapes young people’s labour and educational choices. Furthermore, housing opportunities and strategies differ significantly among young people, a variation that only emerges through qualitative research and attention to conversion factors. Theoretically, we demonstrate the added value of integrating the two frameworks: the Housing Pathway Approach enhances the Capability Approach methodologically, while the latter reinforces the normative and policy-relevant aspects of the first.

This document aims to outline the process of co-creation of housing policy with young people in the city of Amsterdam. It is directed at researchers and policymakers who wish to gain more knowledge of the objectives, strategies and methods pertaining to the development of a Reflexive Policy Agenda.

In this policy brief, we provide relevant guidelines and recommendations for each of these phases, based on our evaluation of the UPLIFT co-creation process in the four different cities. These guidelines and recommendations are meant to inspire and provide support to governments and/or service providers that want to start a similar co-creation process.

For young adults on the Amsterdam housing market the accessibility of housing has been decreasing for years, due to soaring house prices and rents, the shrinkage and residualization of the social rental sector, and the precarization of the labor market. Consequently, many young people struggle to secure an affordable and adequate dwelling and are stuck in insecure and chaotic housing pathways. Current housing policies in Amsterdam are struggling to effectively respond to these challenges. In an effort to better understand and address the specific housing problems of young people, the Municipality of Amsterdam, housing association Lieven de Key, resident organization !Woon, Delft University of Technology and a group of local young people have started a co-creation process within the framework of the H2020 UPLIFT project. The goal of this co-creation process is to unravel the real-life experiences of young people and to co-create new or improved policy initiatives with them. This paper examines the results of said policy co-creation process in order to evaluate its methodology as well as its impact on the participating actors - young people in particular - and on the policymaking approach. We analyze the benefits and limits of this type of participatory practice in addressing housing issues and try to draw conclusions on its applicability in a larger context.

The current document is the result of the research activities carried out in Work Package 3 (WP3) of the UPLIFT project1 in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. It aims to understand which micro, meso and macro level factors influence vulnerable young people's decisions in education, employment and housing, and how these young people create their own strategies and make choices within the possibilities available in the given locality.

In recent years, the housing market of Amsterdam, traditionally known for its large share of social rental dwellings, experienced a trend of commodification and financialization. Due to its central position and good facilities, the Dutch capital has become very popular among both home seekers and investors.

This Guidebook is the final deliverable of the work package 4 (WP4) of the UPLIFT project. The overall aim of this work package was to explore how young people’s voices can be put at the centre of youth policy. In order to do this, we carried out four parallel policy co-creation processes with young people in four different locations across Europe, each with a different focus – education, housing and NEET youth. The process took the best part of three years and involved several institutional stakeholders, as well as dozens of young people. This deliverable is a comprehensive outlook of the WP4 work in all four locations – Tallin, Sfântu Gheorghe, Barakaldo and Amsterdam.

This report examines the scales and dimensions of inequality in the functional urban area (FUA) of Amsterdam, the Netherlands. Our purpose is to understand how the drivers of socio-economic inequality, and the policies responding to these, operate in this local context. Particular attention is paid to the room for action of local policies and the ways in which policy-makers and stakeholders conceptualize, and respond to, the existing challenges.

This report examines the scales and dimensions of inequality in the functional urban area (FUA) of Leuven, in the Flemish region of Belgium. Our purpose is to understand how the drivers of socio-economic inequality, and the policies responding to these, operate in this local context. Particular attention is paid to the room for action of local policies and the ways in which policy-makers and stakeholders conceptualize, and respond to, the existing challenges.

Access to homeownership for young adults is becoming more and more difficult. Italy – where homeownership rates for young adults are steadily decreasing – is a case in point. In the recent past, becoming homeowner was an obvious housing pathway for Italian young adults, even from lower-middle class families. If your parents were homeowner, you became homeowner as well, often with the help of intergenerational transfers. However, the Italian reproduction of homeownership is under severe pressure, as a result of the economic crisis and the subsequent austerity measures. Through in-depth interviews with young adults and their parents, this paper shows how deeply ingrained social expectations and aspirations surrounding homeownership – together with an objective lack of rental options – result in young adults staying longer in their parental home and becoming independent at a later age. This may have a negative impact on the social and economic dynamics within Italian society.

This deliverable is titled ‘Updated Action Plans for the co-creation process’ and it consists of a common methodological approach, the state of the art of the Local Action Plans of the four WP4 implementation sites, and a reflection on the co-creation process.
This deliverable is the formal update of D4.1, which is taken as the starting point to further explain the evolution of the co-creation activities in the four locations. In particular, compared to D4.1 the theoretical section has been updated with some new perspectives on the Capability Approach, and the methodological section has been updated to reflect changed practices, and clearer guidelines on diversity and gender approaches. The four sections on the state of the art of the four Local Action Plans are totally new, and they explain the progress that occurred in each location in terms of stakeholders, participation of young people, process and outputs. Finally, a new section has been added in which we reflect on the nature of the co-creation process as we have experienced it in all the WP4 implementation sites. The deliverable ends with an outline of the future steps that will be taken in WP4.

Most research on urban planning, policy and development only considers legal practices and actors, and treats illegal ones as insignificant anomalies, unable to structurally affect the governance of urban space. However, this approach is inadequate for explaining urban governance in contexts (e.g. several countries in the Global South, the former Soviet bloc and Southern Europe) where illegal practices such as corruption and organized crime infiltration are widespread in many public and economic sectors. This paper addresses the role of illegal actors and practices in urban governance in the Italian context, using urban regime theory as the theoretical frame of reference. The research centres on the analysis of two case studies in the city of Rome (the In-between world investigation of a criminal network that had infiltrated the local administration and shaped several urban pol- icies, and the investigation of episodes of corruption related to the project for the new A.S. Roma soccer stadium). It shows the existence of two shades of ‘grey urban governance’: firstly, the presence of a dark urban regime, centred on a criminal organisation and parallel to the ‘regular’ one; secondly, the use of corruption as a customary practice with which real estate entrepreneurs influence municipal decisions. Overall, this research contributes to moving away from a rhetoric of ‘gentlemanly’ urban capitalism and politics, and suggests the need to revise several aspects of urban regime theory – as well as other approaches to urban governance dynamics in general – in order to incorporate the role of illegal actors and practices.

This report is part of deliverable 4.1 of the H2020 UPLIFT project. It outlines the theoretical and methodological principles of the process of reflexive policy-making that will take place in four UPLIFT implementation sites. In the first part of this report (chapters 2 and 3), these principles are outlined in more detail. After that, a brief synthesis of the four draft local action plans for the co-creation process is provided (chapter 4). We finish this report with a brief conclusion, as well as with a peek into the future of the work project (chapter 5). It is important to realize that both the local action plans and the theoretical and methodological framework are work in progress. We see reflexive policy making as a dynamic and iterative process that requires constant stakeholder consultation, outcome monitoring and outcome evaluation. At the moment of writing, we are only at the very beginning of this process. Therefore, we see this report as a living document that will be regularly updated, adapted and extended in the course of time.

According to basic economics, when vacancy rates rise, house prices should decrease and vice versa, responding to supply and demand mechanisms. However, previous studies have observed that, before the economic crisis, this was not the case in Spain and Malta. It has been questioned whether this paradox is a Mediterranean phenomenon or simply the result of isolated cases of malfunctioning housing market. This paper contributes to this discussion by reviewing the pre-crisis housing market of a third case study: Italy. A Mediterranean housing system perspective is used to analyse the paradox, and methodological issues regarding the definition and measurement of vacancy are addressed. Moreover, the paper explores the consequences of the high Italian vacancy rate within a context of housing shortages and affordability problems. We argue that a better understanding of the characteristics and implications of vacancy is necessary in order to be able to implement sustainable housing and planning policies.

According to basic economics, when vacancy rates rise, house prices should decrease and vice versa, responding to supply and demand mechanisms. However, previous studies (Hoekstra & Vakili-Zad, 2011; Vakili-Zad & Hoekstra, 2011) have observed that, before the economic crisis, this was not the case in countries like Spain and Malta. It has been questioned whether this paradox is a Mediterranean phenomenon or simply the result of isolated cases of malfunctioning housing market. The objective of this paper is to contribute to this discussion by reviewing the pre-crisis market of a third case study: Italy. As in other Southern European countries, vacant housing is a serious problem in Italy, both in major cities and in rural areas. A welfare regime perspective will be used to analyze the paradox and methodological issues with regard to the definition and measurements of vacancy will be addressed. Moreover, the paper will attempt to explore the consequences of the high Italian vacancy rate within a context of severe housing shortages and affordability problems, providing recommendations for further research. We argue that a better understanding of the characteristics and implications of vacancy in different contexts is necessary in order to implement sustainable housing and planning policies.