Interdisciplinary research project to examine bottlenecks in housing supply

Housing shortages are a recurring theme in both public debate and academic research. But explanations for why supply lags behind differ: some argue the problem lies in excessive regulation, others point to market failures. The project Planning failure? Housing supply bottlenecks in Sweden and England and the pursuit of socially and economically sustainable cities aims to move beyond these simplified explanations.

The four-year project has been awarded SEK 6 million in research funding from Formas to carry out an institutional analysis, identifying shortcomings in planning, responsibility, and implementation. Using Uppsala and Cambridge as case studies, the researchers will follow housing projects from planning applications through public consultations, decisions, and the construction of completed homes.

– We want to understand how the interplay between market, regulation, and local actors creates bottlenecks – and how these can be overcome. By comparing Sweden and England, we hope to contribute both new knowledge and practical solutions, says Timothy Blackwell, Researcher in Political Science at IBF and Project leader.

By analyzing interactions between regulation and the market, the researchers aim to further develop today’s theoretical frameworks and help break the deadlock in the current literature, which often points to regulatory barriers or market failures as the main causes of housing shortages. The research findings will, as usual, be published in a series of academic articles, but the final year of the project will largely be devoted to compiling the results in book form. In addition, workshops with stakeholders will be held to propose feasible policy measures and strategies.

The project is a collaboration between Uppsala University and the University of Sheffield and will begin in 2025.