CONVERSATION :: Between a ‘reception crisis’ and a ‘housing crisis(FR/EN)

The recent occupations of vacant government buildings in Brussels, from the Palais des Droits to the future National Crisis Center, painfully display how migration legal categories segment the persons seeking shelter and home in the city, producing specific vulnerabilities and challenges for each group. Meanwhile, processes of urban speculation and gentrification drive up housing inaccessibility and unaffordability, while high rates of vacancy persist. In Brussels, practices such as squatting highlight the connection between these multiple systems of exclusion that affect an ever growing and heterogenous group of people in their right to housing.

Through a conversation between a diverse group of activists, researchers and people affected by a lack of accessible and affordable housing, this event will explore the intersectionality of housing struggles in Brussels, and the role of migration policies therein.

By exploring these urban struggles through activism, acts of contestation and lived experiences, the event intends to provide a space for reflection, support and future-oriented thinking with the intention to move beyond present-day frustration, and provide leverage for a right to housing for all.

▛ PROGRAM-ME ▜

– 6.30pm – Welcome: visit of the exhibition
– 7 – 7.10pm – Introduction to the evening: When ‘reception crisis’ & ‘housing crisis’ meet
– 7.10 – 8pm: Roundtable discussion on the mobilisations for decent housing for asylum seekers, undocumented migrants, and refugees, and what they teach us about the struggle towards housing for all in Brussels
– 8 – 8.30pm – Open conversation
– 8.30pm – Shared meal / iftar