Urban Environment and Housing Inequality in Post-Growth Society: A Case Study of Tokyo
This study examines how urban policies implemented in the name of 'environmental', 'sustainable' and 'green' in the cities of contemporary post-growth society affect serious urban problems such as urban redevelopment, and housing inequality in a case study of Tokyo, Japan. In particular, this paper critically studies how recent urban redevelopment, real estate and housing financialization, private/public housing development and The Tokyo Metropolitan Government's (TMG) policies related to sustainable cities and Green Finance are mutually interrelated in Tokyo.
[Research Questions]
How are Tokyo's urban redevelopment, property and housing financialization and private/public housing development and TMG's housing policies implemented and how are they relevant?
How are "sustainable" and "eco-friendly" housing policies developed in Tokyo, and to what extent are they currently realized? How are these environmental discourses related to housing inequality?
What kinds of discourses on urban redevelopment, financialization of property and housing, and housing and livelihoods are (or are not) present in TMG's sustainable cities and Green Finance urban policies?
To answer these research questions, this paper analyses TMG's policy discourses on sustainable cities and Green Finance to illustrate how contemporary urban issues such as urban redevelopment and the financialization of property and housing are addressed in the name of 'urban environment' policies.
[Methodology]
The Sociology of Knowledge Approach to Discourse (SKAD) is used in this study as a method for analyzing the discourse of TMG policy documents and data based on interviews with relevant actors.
[Anticipated Outcomes]
The case study of Tokyo in this paper reveals the discourse formation around the urban environment of the metropolis in a post-growth society. The study is expected to show that TMG's discourse of 'sustainable' and 'environmentally friendly' functions in a sense to mask 'inconvenient truths' such as urban redevelopment, and the reality of inequalities in access to housing.