The Flip Side of Housing as Social Right of Citizenship

In the current context of severe urban housing shortages globally, the issue of housing as social right, enfolded into right to the city, tends to emphasize citizens’ demand from the state to the neglect of citizens’ obligations and responsibilities to the state. The concept of contributing citizenship emphasizes a reciprocal relation between the state and its citizens; citizens’ legitimate claim on rights to the state’s social welfare resources is based on their contribution to the development and maintenance of the state. The three essential citizen contributions are military service, active employment and replenishing the citizenry. This paper argues that good housing is an effective instrument in engendering contributory citizenship. This paper demonstrates how the young Singapore state, independent since 1965, has been able to instrumentalize the provision of subsidized public housing to extract, with minimum coercion, the citizens’ contributions to successful nation building.