The Modernisation of Housing in England

This paper considers changes in the housing market and housing policy following the major deregulation and privatisation of housing in England in the 1980s and 1990s. It highlights developments that were not anticipated, the continuing importance of social rented housing and the renewed interest of government in housing and refers to these in the context of previous accounts of the modernisation of housing tenure. The paper also considers emerging social and spatial divisions within urban England and suggests that while there is considerable continuity in these patterns, tenure has become a less effective indicator of neighbourhood difference. A more complex pattern of social and spatial division is associated with stratification, market stretch and new patterns of differentiation.