Structural Barriers to Finding Home: Poverty Governance in a Housing and Homelessness 'Crisis'

Abstract

This thesis examines the political changes and processes that impact people experiencing homelessness in the Halifax Regional Municipality (HRM) in Nova Scotia. I use the theoretical lens of poverty governance to argue that the response to these crises has introduced and solidified mechanisms to manage and control those experiencing homelessness, without leveraging long term housing solutions.The focus on market-based and temporary solutions to homelessness, at all levels of government, fail to address systemic factors proliferating homelessness. Based on interviews with those experiencing homelessness and homelessness service providers, I have connected local processes to the poverty governance literature. In the HRM, those experiencing homelessness are medicalized, without access to appropriate medical care; they are criminalized, which hinders their ability to access housing and employment, and; they are socialized in off-street services to minimize their presence in public space, without means of accessing housing. These mechanisms are desirable to the state as they may reduce the public visibility of homelessness but are detrimental to those experiencing homelessness