The housing shortage is a global problem that cannot be resolved through market-driven models of home ownership. This book, therefore, postulates a radical shift from house to housing and from the individual to the collective. The reintroduction of the term "collective" is here understood as a mechanism to refocus housing as a community-building, solidarity-building, and city-building activity.

The book addresses the topic in four chapters-from alternative urban housing typologies and concepts of communal construction to historical models from which the current housing struggle can learn. The individual essays include examples from five different continents.