SRI Submission to the Special Rapporteur on the Right to Housing

In response to the Special Rapporteur’s call for inputs on housing discrimination and spatial segregation, SRI made a submission addressing the impact of discrimination based on gender and sexuality norms. 

The submission highlights the ways housing and home are seen as the purview of “the family” underpinned by patriarchal heteronormative norms, with any deviation leading to exclusion from communities and housing.

The submission also provides detailed information on housing discrimination and spatial segregation against sex workers in Canada, and argues that the decriminalization of sex work is key to the realization of the right to housing. Finally, the submission addresses the impact of colonialism on housing and segregation, and the gendered impacts of neo-liberal economic policies including IMF-imposed structural adjustments and austerity measures, especially in the Global South.