Invasion of social housing and the perception of loneliness: A case study on subdivisions with uninhabited homes in the southeast of Ciudad Juárez

Abstract

This work derives from the need to make visible the perspectives, emotions and interactions of those who, at present, inhabit social housing through a process of invasion in an area that historically has been characterized by a high number of uninhabited dwellings, mainly as a result of neoliberal policies. At the national level, the municipality of Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico, has been among the entities with the highest number of uninhabited homes. In the southeastern part of the municipality, the situation is increasing, deriving in practices and perspectives that configure the plot of these places invisibilized under the context of abandonment presented. In this sense, making visible the new forms of inhabiting the uninhabited necessarily implies addressing the relationship between people, objects and built environments, elements that are little developed when it comes to assessing the impacts of urban policy. Through a qualitative approach, the use of the phenomenological method, in-depth interviews and non-participant observation as techniques for obtaining information, this work gathers emotions and perspectives that are situated between loneliness and resistance to abandonment, in a context that limits the possibility of social interactions, and that contrasts with the need for housing as an object of heritage and with the difficulties to access it.