There shall be Houses, Security and Comfort

The paper examines the link between habitat security and human security, arguing that adequate housing is a prerequisite for sustainable livelihoods. It focuses on South Africa's post-apartheid housing subsidy programme, detailing its delivery outputs, the shift toward 'sustainable human settlements' via the 2004 Breaking New Ground policy, and the role of security of tenure during the 2008 international financial crisis.

• Housing is presented as a critical component of human security, which shifts the focus of security from state territorial defence to the safety and well-being of individuals, specifically protecting them from chronic threats of deprivation and repression.
• Inadequate housing and slum conditions lead to severe socio-economic vulnerabilities, including increased susceptibility to infectious diseases, lack of access to basic public services, and psychological trauma.
• The United Nations' Millennium Development Goal 7, specifically Target 11, aims to significantly improve the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers by 2020, though the author notes a lack of dedicated credit lines from international financial institutions to fund these goals.
• South Africa's housing policy evolved from a focus on rapid delivery of single houses on the periphery to the 2004 'Breaking New Ground' (Comprehensive Plan for the Creation of Sustainable Human Settlements) policy, which emphasizes multicultural communities, rental stock, and social infrastructure.
• Between April 1994 and December 2008, the South African government delivered 2.7 million subsidized housing units, benefiting approximately 13 million people (about 23% of the population).
• The South African government's housing grant allocation increased significantly from R2.5 billion in 2000 to R10 billion by 2008, with over R100 billion committed to subsidies since 1994.
• There is evidence suggesting a correlation between the provision of adequate housing and a reduction in crime in some areas; for example, in Khayelitsha, Cape Town, reported cases of common assault and residential burglary decreased between 2001 and 2008 as housing was completed.
• The 2008 international financial crisis highlighted the importance of security of tenure, as thousands of South African bondholders faced severe stress, with over 35,000 lagging behind on payments by more than four months as of April 2009.

APA

Tshitereke, C. (2009). There shall be Houses, Security and Comfort. Institute for Security Studies. https://issafrica.s3.amazonaws.com/site/uploads/Paper196.pdf

Chicago

Tshitereke, Clarence. There shall be Houses, Security and Comfort. Institute for Security Studies, 2009. https://issafrica.s3.amazonaws.com/site/uploads/Paper196.pdf.

Wikipedia

{{cite report |last1=Tshitereke |first1=Clarence |title=There shall be Houses, Security and Comfort |publisher=Institute for Security Studies |date=August 2009 |url=https://issafrica.s3.amazonaws.com/site/uploads/Paper196.pdf |access-date=23 October 2026 |via=Climate Insights Directory}}

BibTeX

@techreport{tshitereke2009there, author = {Tshitereke, Clarence}, title = {{There shall be Houses, Security and Comfort}}, institution = {Institute for Security Studies}, year = {2009}, month = aug, url = {https://issafrica.s3.amazonaws.com/site/uploads/Paper196.pdf}, urldate = {2026-10-23}, note = {Indexed by Climate Insights Directory} }