Housing inequality: a systematic scoping review

Abstract

Housing inequality is far more than a housing matter. To discover how housing inequality has been used across disciplines, and how this may inform future housing research, we performed a systematic scoping review. We found that housing inequality provides multiple understandings as well as a variety of uses, for example, as a measurement tool, a conceptual device, or as subject matter. To draw together useful lessons from this conceptually diverse body of work, we identify four principle uses of ‘housing inequality’ in the literature – an outcome, an experience, a product, and a construct. These four framings offer a level of conceptual clarity for thinking about, and researching, the different expressions of housing inequality. It contributes to housing research by providing an approach for taking into account the multiple and complex roles of housing, and its distribution and impacts across society.