
Parks and Houses for the People - Thevet
https://placesjournal.org/article/swedish-social-democratic-parks-and-houses-for-the-people/
======
yt-sdb
This topic reminds me of Jenny Odell's "How to Do Nothing" [1]. The book links
the attention economy with the loss of public space in ways that I had never
considered but now believe to be true.

Consider two thoughts. First, a mall is not a true public space. It is a
branded, controlled experience designed for shopping. For many teenagers in
America, the mall is a default hang out space—or at least was when I was a
kid. Second, today you can easily see an ad on your phone before you say hello
to your partner or kids, before you go outside, before you use the bathroom.

Underpinning these issues is the gnawing feeling, for many people, that we
must be _more productive_. Time is money. Space is money. You should be doing
something or, if you must do nothing, do nothing so that you can do something
more later. Did you know that these CEOs read this many books this year? This
successful person mediates an hour a day. What have you shipped today?

Her solution is not to delete your social media accounts, throw out your smart
phone, and disappear into the woods. Her solution is to ground yourself. Watch
birds. Learn about who lived on the land before you. Talk to your neighbors.
Walk down a river. Get involved in local politics. This process of remembering
that you're a physical being in a physical place, that you live in a real
community, is a reminder that your life is interdependent upon everything
around you.

I'm not quite sure how this is related to public housing, but I suspect it is,
e.g. this article's main theme is that these public spaces grew out of labor
movements that also fought for things like the 8-hour work day.

[1]
[http://www.jennyodell.com/writing.html](http://www.jennyodell.com/writing.html)

~~~
staticautomatic
You might enjoy George Lakoff's book Metaphors We Live By.

------
keenmaster
Is there a good faith counter-narrative to the history of People’s Parks and
Houses that isn’t presented here? I’m genuinely curious. The whole movement
seems fascinating, but I wasn’t satisfied with the explanation of why Sweden
adopted a more neoliberal approach after WWII. You’d think there are at least
some downsides of bottom-up welfare, otherwise it would have persisted for
longer. If Swedes really wanted to they could try a similar approach to
welfare today. I suspect it takes a lot of communal bandwidth that is scarcer
in the modern age. The average person is substituting whatever “work leisure”
they may have performed before with pure leisure. The former, more civic form
of leisure is necessary for bottom-up welfare.

------
danbmil99
The US was building similar housing around the same time. We call them The
Projects.

In the UK they're called Council Flats.

~~~
viburnum
The big difference is in the social housing model rent is on a sliding scale
so you get a mix of incomes. In America public housing was only for very poor
people. America's public housing era also coincided with deindustrialization,
the end of full employment, and the neoliberal turn. Good social policies work
together. When some policies are neglected the policies that exist get blamed
for the overall failure. For example, in America there's poverty, so schools
in poor areas are blamed. Nobody in rich suburbs wants charter schools. The
problem is obviously economic policies that cause poverty, not the schools,
but because there's no full employment policy, the schools get blamed.

------
viburnum
I’ve read elsewhere that the wage-earner funds were never very popular, and
were actually a break from the tradition of the Social Democrats to only
pursue popular policies, often with the support of the Liberals or Center.

------
Ozzie_osman
History will look back at how one of the most prosperous nations in the
world's history (modern America) had millions of people living without decent
access to housing and healthcare.

I don't know what the right model is for sure, and whether it is the Swedish
one, but whatever it is, it isn't what we're doing now.

~~~
unclebucknasty
Like too much these days, the alternatives we've been provided are at the
extremes. They seem to be offered less as viable solutions and more as tools
for sorting people into one of two buckets.

So, we must be either communists or laissez faire capitalists without a hint
of regulation.

But, of course real solutions--particularly to such macro scale challenges--
are seldom found at the extremes.

If we could spark an earnest discussion about what a saner version of
capitalism would look like, then we could find a solution, and relatively
easily vs what our "manipulated" experience might suggest.

EDIT: looking at the responses, then rereading my comment, I realize I wasn't
clear. What I was trying to say is the state of things is such that the
solutions offered are _characterized_ as communist, with the offered
alternative being a form of laissez-faire economics, positioned as "standard"
capitalism.

My bad. I blew that one.

~~~
ihm
Does this kind of "both sidesism" really engage with the reality of the
situation or does it just sound "smart" because it is generically claims that
there is something complex about the issue?

Here is this comment applied to the situation in America ~160 years ago:

Like too much these days, the alternatives we've been provided are at the
extremes. They seem to be offered less as viable solutions and more as tools
for sorting people into one of two buckets.

So, we must be either abolitionists or in favor of the harshest slavery
without a hint of regulation.

But, of course real solutions--particularly to such macro scale challenges--
are seldom found at the extremes.

If we could spark an earnest discussion about what a saner version of slavery
would look like, then we could find a solution, and relatively easily vs what
our "manipulated" experience might suggest.

~~~
pdonis
_> Here is this comment applied to the situation in America ~160 years ago_

No, a proper application would be:

If we could spark an earnest discussion about how to move towards abolition of
slavery peacefully, we could avoid having to fight a war that kills a million
people and does not improve the actual material condition of the slaves at
all, not to mention leading to another century of Jim Crow laws.

But it was already too late in 1860 to have that kind of discussion. It should
have happened in the 1820s or 1830s, when many Southern states were indeed
considering abolishing slavery--until the fiery no-compromise rhetoric of
abolitionists swung the South the other way. The Virginia state legislature
had a bill abolishing slavery in 1831 that was close to passing--until copies
of William Lloyd Garrison's pamphlet containing copies of his "no moderation"
speech arrived and were read by the members.

~~~
ihm
> The Virginia state legislature had a bill abolishing slavery in 1831 that
> was close to passing--until copies of William Lloyd Garrison's pamphlet
> containing copies of his "no moderation" speech arrived and were read by the
> members.

I'm no expert in this period but from a cursory research I don't see how you
could make this claim. This page gives a completely different impression,
which is basically that the legislature punted on the issue[0].

Are we have discussions about how to move toward abolition of the wage system
and minoritarian control of the economy peacefully? I am all for that. From
history, though, it seems that those who have power are not liable to
relinquish that power without putting up a fight.

[0]:
[https://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Virginia_Slavery_Debate...](https://www.encyclopediavirginia.org/Virginia_Slavery_Debate_of_1831-1832_The)

~~~
pdonis
IIRC the story I referred to is in Beveridge's _Life Of John Marshall_ ,
Volume IV. Unfortunately I don't have my copy handy to check right now.

