Proposal for the coordinated application of non-conventional House-building experiments to official programmes

Abstract

It is our desire to divest the work we have presented of all claims to novelty: the progressive form of habitation is not a new proposition; it is, as we have said before, as old as housing itself, as the very history of man and his relationship with shelter. Our desire to contribute lies in placing more importance on this modality, increasing its possibilities; taking it from its informal and peripheral state to an alternative receiving support from all disciplines. Regarding this subject, two conflicting realities can be seen every day: people build mainly in a progressive way; governments take no notice of that method of building whenever they invest in housing. The authors aim to transform that clashing reality in which acting forces are subtracted into a point of convergence in which the intervening elements are added together. If progressive housing, which is without support or respect, questioned and interfered with, constitutes the predominant form of construction, it cannot be doubted that if it were guaranteed by public authorities and received adequate investment, it would provide an alternative of the utmost importance among the solutions to the problem of housing in Latin America.