The Allmännytta – for the Market or for the Many? : A qualitative study on competing ideals in Swedish public rental housing during the current housing shortage

Abstract: The majority of Sweden’s municipalities have for the last decade reported a housing shortage. This housing shortage, created by a combination of low construction rates and a rapidly growing population, has resulted in the biggest building boom Sweden has seen since the Million Dwellings Program. Although building rates are high, there is a continuous trend of housing becoming increasingly expensive, and the housing shortage today is mainly that of affordable rental housing. During the great housing shortage of the 20th century, the allmännytta, Sweden’s public rental companies was created and their role has traditionally been to provide affordable rental housing for all. Since the 1990s this role has changed and in 2011 the allbolagen 2010:879 was implemented, requiring these previous non-profit companies to act according to business principles, in addition to being socially responsible. This thesis investigates the role of Swedish public rental companies in regards to the current housing shortage and in the light of this law change. This is done through the use of qualitative interviews with representatives of the municipality, the tenant’s association and the allmännytta in the cities of Uppsala, Västerås and Örebro. The study finds that the business principles of the allbolagen 2010:879 is interpreted in different ways by the different allmännytta companies. It further finds that the role of the allmännytta in regards to the housing shortage still is to build rental housing, but the limitations created by the requirement of business principles makes this increasingly difficult as the allmännytta cannot act in ways different from the private sector. Instead they try to take their role of being socially responsible through other, related projects and by housing a disproportionally large amount of those incapable of acquiring housing on their own. Affordability is also increasingly made difficult as the municipality set related goals for the allmännytta’s housing construction, such as sustainability, which pushes prices up. Originally created to deal with the housing shortage of the 20th century, the gradual changes of housing politics since the 1990s renders the allmännytta as neither responsible nor capable to deal with the housing shortage of today by providing and constructing affordable housing. The study finds that the role of the allmännytta in regards to the housing shortage is conflicting, as older ideals of the Folkhem and newer principles of neoliberalism are entangled.