Shifting Housing Policy and the Role of COVID-19.

The state of housing in South Africa has been hit by the COVID-19 pandemic in many complex ways. The urgency of the circumstances have temporarily shifted the capacities of state to deal with ongoing issues of access to adequate housing, as the emergency demanded a new intensity in focus on public health along with temporarily housing the homeless and delivering testing and quarantine facilities. Nine months on from the first confirmed COVID-19 case in the country, severe economic downturn has decimated both government budgets and people’s earning capacities leaving a pressured housing system under even more strain than before. Unpacking findings from expert interviews within the housing sector in South Africa, this paper explores a range of emotions, experience and perspectives across four themes in the findings: shifting policy and budget restraints, increased land invasions, inter-departmental shortcomings and the renting of Breaking New Ground (BNG) units. Outcomes reveal that policy is limited in its ability to respond to the ever increasing housing needs of South Africa’s people. Furthermore, by exploring the function of COVID-19 in shifting housing policy in South Africa, the critical role that South African citizens will play in shaping the housing landscape going forward is revealed.