Many scholars have asked themselves if and for how long they should use the concept of “post-socialism.” We review some ways in which post-socialism is no longer used productively and suggest that one way to analyze the enduring effects of socialism (a useful role for the concept of post-socialism) is by paying attention to how economic and political elites in Central and Eastern Europe continue to use the ghost of state-socialism as the ultimate boogeyman, disciplinary device, and “ideological antioxidant.” We call this blend of post-1989 anti-communism and neoliberal hegemony “zombie socialism,” and we argue that it is a key component of contemporary capitalism in Central and Eastern Europe. We illustrate briefly some cases of zombie socialism, using data such as EU 28 statistics on labor, wages, work–life (im)balance, income tax, housing, and housing policies to show the effects of this hegemonic discourse. The presence of zombie socialism for almost three decades in Central and Eastern Europe made some of these countries “more” capitalist than countries with longer capitalist traditions in Europe. We join others who have suggested that there is nothing to transition any longer, as the “transition” is long over.

Emerging affordability problems in British housing have accentuated the role of parental support in facilitating entry to homeownership, with financial transfers and in-kind support smoothening transitions for many. This article explores housing trajectories, focusing on how dependency and autonomy are negotiated within and across generations in relation to gifts, loans and in-kind transfers for home purchase. It draws on the experiences of a group of young adults aged 25–35 and those family members who supported them in acquiring a home. We consider the nature of support, and how those giving and receiving it understand this exchange. We show that gifting for homeownership is an ‘ideal gift’, allowing givers to exercise moral control over the receivers by supporting a normalized tenure choice. Managing relationships of indebtedness between kin presupposes negotiations in which the maintenance of autonomy is paramount. The article examines four types of negotiations and their impact on intergenerational relations.

Tax foreclosure offers an opportunity to investigate processes of disinvestment in the city. Prior research has not considered how tax foreclosure administration protects or further damages neighborhoods where foreclosure occurs. Detroit’s loss of households led to disinvestment in housing and demolition of structures. In addition, at each of the three stages of property foreclosure and disposition, implementers took actions that promised to encourage disinvestment in property by facilitating the spread of blight and encouraging negative externalities. This occurred because (1) foreclosures took many owner-occupied properties; (2) the sale of properties to government entities was small and did not promote reuse; and (3) the foreclosure auctions disadvantaged purchasers who would become owner-occupants, channeled properties in strong neighborhoods to investors at low prices, and sold properties disproportionately to destructive buyers.

Across high-income economies, more urbanites live longer on their own, in non-family households, than ever before. Solo dwellers amount to 39%, 28%, 24% and 34% of all households in Europe (Eurosta...

In the context of mounting housing market pressures and an international swell in the formation of non-family households, especially among younger-adults, this paper examines share house (shea-hausu), an increasingly popular form of shared private rental housing in Tokyo. We frame our study in relation to shifting socioeconomic and demographic conditions affecting single, young Japanese adults, their aspirations and life-courses, as well as forms and practices in Japanese housing. We elaborate on the way shea-hausu are provided, and discuss three sets of techniques that together configure shea-hausu as a product distinct from other forms of renting, but also re-script sharing as a particular kind of ‘desirable living’ among single young adults. Furthermore, we show how shea-hausu both enables the pursuit of new experiences of ‘home’ and further entrenches traditionalist views of the needs and wants of solo dwellers.

This paper explores housing trajectories of young adults and practices of intergenerational support in Romania drawing on narratives of a group of people aged 25–39 living (quasi-) autonomously in Bucharest, and those of kin that support them. It describes three housing arrangements in which family (parental) resources and property play an important role, and argues that in this context of high interdependence, unequal relationships develop between parents and adult children marked by professed entitlement on the part of children and controlling generosity on the part of parents. It shows how interdependent practices of homemaking and material support combine to shape housing trajectories and define the boundaries of ownership over homes that are shared, gifted or given in use within kin networks, sheltering young adults from the vagaries of the market.