Strengthening knowledge systems for housing justice: lessons from civil society coalitions against evictions

Promoting the effective use of evidence in policymaking is a cross-cutting challenge. This challenge is even more complex for those producing knowledge at the margins of society, as those experience housing injustices.  

Certain forms of knowledge often go unseen because unequal systems and institutions shape whose knowledge deserves recognition. However, there are experiences in which coalitions have successfully come together to create and share evidence, built alliances and shaped the conditions needed to turn local knowledge into policy change.

It is fundamental to understand the conditions, contextual factors and knowledge trajectories that have allowed this to happen and how those experiences have strengthened knowledge systems. 

This project examines the Zero Evictions Campaign (website in Portuguese), a national civil society coalition that emerged in Brazil during the coronavirus pandemic to stop forced evictions.  

Research activities will generate a collaborative analysis of how the Zero Evictions Campaign has strengthened knowledge systems and mobilised evidence to create impactful advocacy strategies towards housing justice.  

This will draw broader lessons about the conditions and strategies that allow local organisations to navigate unequal contexts and impact policy, fighting discrimination, violence and inequalities.

What is IIED doing?

IIED is partnering with Instituto Pólis and housing social movements in Brazil to develop activities that aim to:  

• Understand the historical processes and accumulative knowledge that created the conditions for the emergence of the Zero Eviction Campaign;
• Identify the different strategies, forms of evidence produced, stakeholders and policy targets that have successfully impacted judicial courts decisions, the adoption of laws suspending evictions and governance and policy transformation;
• Support spaces for the Zero Eviction Campaign members and grassroots groups to reflect upon and strengthen their documentation, monitoring and advocacy activities, and;
• Facilitate trans-local learning through the Hub for Housing Justice, by systematising lessons about the tactics, enabling and disabling conditions that have shaped the ability of civil society coalitions to create impactful and advocacy strategies towards housing justice. 

Forced evictions constitute “a gross violation of human rights” (PDF) and continue to be one of the most dramatic manifestations of housing injustices and discrimination. Recognising the knowledge and experiences of those facing their direct consequences is critical to developing effective and rights-based policy, legal and governance responses.  

This project aims to better understand how such knowledge has been effectively mobilised for transformation.