In 2016, the government agency in charge of housing policies in Portugal commissioned an extensive research and dissemination project aimed at marking the centennial of public-funded housing in Portugal, scheduled for 2018. In 1918, the Portuguese government was first authorised to draw on the public purse to subsidise low-budget dwellings of both private and public initiative, seeking to address the stringent needs felt by low-wage workers in Lisbon and Porto, in the unsettling context of a young, fragile republic faced with domestic and global challenges. There followed a succession of public measures and programmes across political regimes, from dictatorship (1926-1974) to post-revolution consolidation and European integration (1986), and eventually to State withdrawal from direct intervention and free-market, right-to-buy and mortgage subsidising policies at the turn of this century. Measures were aimed at diverse social groups, with disparate ambitions and underlying philosophies. Although the actual, material output of these 100 years has yet to be more precisely determined – in numbers of schemes and dwellings, for example –, the centennial was an opportunity to not only put to rest a few myths of Portuguese public housing history but also draw a wide-angle analysis of the overarching concerns and persistent tropes across this period. This paper discusses how advancing our historical knowledge of these 100 years’ output can better prepare us to address the housing crisis in Portugal in the present time. By examining the arc of policies that ranged from hesitant State intervention to retreat, leading to dismissed, partly vacant housing estates, with soaring house prices and the current sense of emergency reaching the lower- and middle-classes, I propose that the history of public housing architecture is key in finding new solutions. My main argument is that our priority should be to know exactly what we have built (by and for whom, under what circumstances and where) to decide how this can be put towards minimising the problem: through renewal, repurposing, reappropriation, simple maintenance or, in last resort, partial or complete replacement. The housing battle in Portugal, I posit, can only be addressed if all the ammunition can be summoned, starting with what already is there to be (re)used, and see its use life extended.

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Esta publicação está associada ao(s) registo(s) de referências nos media seguinte(s):

• Das escolas aos tribunais, os edifícios que unem comunidades (Público)