The Politics of Housing Informality: A Critical Analysis of the Changing Policy Discourse on Informal Subdivided Housing in Post-Handover Hong Kong

In recent decades, scholars have demonstrated that housing informality, traditionally prevalent in the Global South, has emerged across developing societies and megacities. While most previous studies have investigated the regulatory regimes of informal settlements, less attention has been paid to the policy discourses and the intricate negotiations with various actors in the policymaking process, especially in developed regions. This study focuses on Hong Kong, a highly advanced neoliberal economy operating under a politically hybrid regime, and its policy interventions regarding informal subdivided units (SDUs)—residential compartments divided from a larger domestic quarter—which emerged after the handover. We employ the method of critical policy discourse analysis to examine the changing official discourses and interventions targeting SDUs between 2010 and 2023, during which the number of SDUs saw a rapid increase. The data comprises official documents published between 2000 and 2023, including policy addresses, legislation papers, minutes of official meetings, blogs written by officials, and press releases. Based on line-by-line coding of 482 sampled articles, we identify four stages of SDU interventions: 1) enhancing building safety and fostering urban renewal; 2) addressing housing shortage and unaffordability through poverty alleviation and new development schemes; 3) introducing selective re-regulation of the informal housing market through tenancy control; and 4) moving toward complete eradication of SDUs. The findings demonstrate that the institutional governance of housing informality is far from a consistent and homogeneous regulatory system, but rather a dynamic process constituted by negotiations among various actors competing for conflicting interests and values, susceptible to changing socio-economic circumstances and political configurations. Intriguingly, the findings also illustrate the politicisation of the phenomenon of SDUs as they have been framed, positioned, and intervened, contingent upon the political opportunities and/or crises in specific periods. This study contributes to a more nuanced and contextualised understanding of policy interventions on housing informality, offering insights for policymakers and activists in strategising their policy advocacy more innovatively and effectively.