Drawing on in-depth interviews, participant observation and my experiences of working with young homeless people in refuges, in this thesis I develop an analysis which identifies some key spatial practices through which young people negotiate the field of homelessness in inner-city Sydney. The particular contribution of this work is to consider homelessness in terms of a theorised understanding of the broader role of place within homelessness, rather than in terms of the immediacy of cause or solution. While acknowledging the importance of the large body of work which has focused on the structural causes of homelessness and the need for a clear policy-oriented definition of homelessness, I develop an alternative agenda for a focus on young homeless people's struggles to feel 'in place' and 'at home'. These struggles throw into relief the need to understand young people???s homelessness in terms of a search, not just for a place to stay, but for a place to belong. Utilising the rich body of work which explores the important relation of place and subjectivity, I connect young people???s experiences of place within homelessness with the broader social and phenomenological concepts of ???displacement??? and ???implacement???. In particular, I focus on the spatial relations through which young people construct and organise their daily paths and begin to make sense of their often painful and chaotic lives and their fears about the future. I contextualise their fragile experiences of being somewhere in a broader spatial structure of constant movement and grief and feelings of alienation from the wider community. I consider the enduring role of past homes in their continuing struggle to piece together a way of ???being at home??? both in terms of drawing together a network of physical places of safety and in terms of experiencing a sense of acceptance, recognition and rootedness through place. I point to the critical need to include broader understandings of both home and homelessness in addressing the displacement which shapes the experience of homelessness for young people and impacts on the success of immediate measures developed to respond to it.

This thesis investigates the extent to which human rights law may be used to challenge the forced eviction of people who live in public space under public space laws. The specific case study is the operation of Darwin City Council By-law 103, which bans camping, or adults sleeping in a public place between sunset and sunrise. The by-law is used to criminalise or forcibly evict people who live in public space in Darwin in the Northern Territory. Darwin has the highest proportionate number of homeless people of any capital city in Australia. Indigenous people are significantly over-represented. The thesis charts recent legislative changes across Australia to demonstrate that public space laws, such as Darwin City Council By-law 103, continue to be popular public policy responses to law and order concerns. This legal regulation is being undertaken without ensuring compliance with international human rights standards. There has been a marked increase in Australia of the use of available domestic and international human rights tools to raise concerns about the enforcement of these laws against people living in public space. Through a review of secondary sources, the thesis establishes that some 15 human rights have been identified as potentially engaged by such enforcement but Australian jurisprudence has yet to emerge. The thesis selects the human right to privacy, family and home for detailed analysis. It interrogates available evidence from Darwin, international and comparative jurisprudence and secondary sources to determine whether the forced eviction of people living in public space under Darwin City Council By-law 103 may be found to violate the right to respect for privacy, family and home in a particular case. The study aims to make a specific contribution to growing endeavours to promote the human rights of people who are homeless, including people who live in public space. Its detailed analysis is designed to support a human rights litigation strategy at both domestic and international level, in order to challenge the extent to which people living in public space are subjected to criminalisation and forced eviction when they have nowhere else to live.

Abstract People who are homeless are portrayed to be a distinct type of ‘homeless person’. Within scholarly research literature, their state of homelessness has been presented as informative of who they are. On both an individual and collective level, people without homes are ascribed with identities on the basis of their homelessness. Their voices and perspectives rarely contribute to broader knowledge about who they are as people. As such, the imposed ‘homeless identity’ has the consequence of positioning them as ‘other’ than the ‘normal’ people with homes. Using an ethnographic approach, this study aims to understand the day-to-day lives and identities of people who are homeless. Approximately one hundred people who slept and interacted within inner suburban Brisbane’s public places participated in this research. To learn about how they lived and who they saw themselves as individuals, I observed them, socialised with them, engaged them in informal conversations and formal interviews. This approach to fieldwork, conducted over a six month period, provided me with the opportunity to witness diverse aspects of daily lives. Further, the ethnographic engagement enabled a consideration of the ways people enacted and displayed different aspects of their identities across different social and physical places. For the individuals who participated in this study, there was a stark distinction between how they lived, on the one hand, and the type of people they identified themselves as, on the other. They were comfortable describing their lives in ways that deviated from what they saw as the ‘mainstream’, but at the same time, they aligned themselves with this ‘mainstream’. Research participants expressed a strong view that their experiences of homelessness did not offer any purchase in explaining who they were, and how they thought about the world. The public places in which they lived were perceived as problematic. Public places were dangerous and the site of unwanted interactions. Although living in public places meant that interactions and friendships with other people who were homeless was a reality, these interactions did not constitute a ‘homeless collective’. More fundamentally, however, living in public places meant having no legitimate places, and having limited capacity to control day-to-day lives. The participants in this research articulated stereotypical notions of what home meant to them – home was a physical structure, a house. Similarly, home was a solution to their lives as homeless. Their constructions of home can also be seen as symbolic of their aspirations to find their ‘place’, and engage in the ‘mainstream’ society they feel disconnected from. While public places were associated with limited control over daily lives, the people in this research also exercised agency in enacting different aspects of their identities. Mediated by the social and physical constraints within their environment, they displayed an awareness of social expectations and emphasised elements of the self to achieve specific ends. Identities matter. An understanding of the identities of people experiencing homelessness, from their perspectives, can contribute toward the development of homelessness practice and policy responses. A distinction is made between solving problems people may have and solving homelessness. In terms of the latter, the thesis concludes that the provision of ‘normal’ housing and the availability of support, as distinct from mandatory engagement with case management, is the most appropriate response to the needs of the people who participated in this research.

Abstract People who are homeless are portrayed to be a distinct type of ‘homeless person’. Within scholarly research literature, their state of homelessness has been presented as informative of who they are. On both an individual and collective level, people without homes are ascribed with identities on the basis of their homelessness. Their voices and perspectives rarely contribute to broader knowledge about who they are as people. As such, the imposed ‘homeless identity’ has the consequence of positioning them as ‘other’ than the ‘normal’ people with homes. Using an ethnographic approach, this study aims to understand the day-to-day lives and identities of people who are homeless. Approximately one hundred people who slept and interacted within inner suburban Brisbane’s public places participated in this research. To learn about how they lived and who they saw themselves as individuals, I observed them, socialised with them, engaged them in informal conversations and formal interviews. This approach to fieldwork, conducted over a six month period, provided me with the opportunity to witness diverse aspects of daily lives. Further, the ethnographic engagement enabled a consideration of the ways people enacted and displayed different aspects of their identities across different social and physical places. For the individuals who participated in this study, there was a stark distinction between how they lived, on the one hand, and the type of people they identified themselves as, on the other. They were comfortable describing their lives in ways that deviated from what they saw as the ‘mainstream’, but at the same time, they aligned themselves with this ‘mainstream’. Research participants expressed a strong view that their experiences of homelessness did not offer any purchase in explaining who they were, and how they thought about the world. The public places in which they lived were perceived as problematic. Public places were dangerous and the site of unwanted interactions. Although living in public places meant that interactions and friendships with other people who were homeless was a reality, these interactions did not constitute a ‘homeless collective’. More fundamentally, however, living in public places meant having no legitimate places, and having limited capacity to control day-to-day lives. The participants in this research articulated stereotypical notions of what home meant to them – home was a physical structure, a house. Similarly, home was a solution to their lives as homeless. Their constructions of home can also be seen as symbolic of their aspirations to find their ‘place’, and engage in the ‘mainstream’ society they feel disconnected from. While public places were associated with limited control over daily lives, the people in this research also exercised agency in enacting different aspects of their identities. Mediated by the social and physical constraints within their environment, they displayed an awareness of social expectations and emphasised elements of the self to achieve specific ends. Identities matter. An understanding of the identities of people experiencing homelessness, from their perspectives, can contribute toward the development of homelessness practice and policy responses. A distinction is made between solving problems people may have and solving homelessness. In terms of the latter, the thesis concludes that the provision of ‘normal’ housing and the availability of support, as distinct from mandatory engagement with case management, is the most appropriate response to the needs of the people who participated in this research.

This thesis is centrally concerned with the question of how non-government organisations (NGOs) can support marginalised young people and the role the state plays in facilitating this. It utilises a comparative case study methodology and examines the circumstances of two NGOs, Twenty10: Gay and Lesbian Youth Support, located in Sydney, Australia and the Albert Kennedy Trust (AKT) which is located in both London and Manchester in the United Kingdom. Twenty10 and AKT share a similar client base: both work with gay, lesbian, bisexual and/or transgendered (GLBT) young people experiencing homelessness or in a housing crisis. Both also engage in advocacy and service provision. At the time of my fieldwork Twenty10 and AKT differed in two key respects. First, AKT operated in a political context that was significantly more open to NGO advocacy than was the case for Twenty10. Second, AKT was supported almost entirely by the work of volunteers and through philanthropic support, whereas Twenty10 received the bulk of its funding from government. These differing factors allow a consideration of how the varying nature of an NGO???s relationship with the state impacts upon their activities within varying political contexts. The theoretical frameworks drawn upon in this thesis are those of citizenship theory and queer theory. Citizenship theory is particularly useful in analysing the objectives of Twenty10 and AKT, which focus on redressing the distributive and recognition based needs of their young people. The strategies employed by these organisations are also both subsumed within the normative framework of citizenship theory ??? while nonetheless being dependent upon how closely each engages with the state. These case studies are situated against the queer critique of citizenship discourses, which emphasise its normalising and de-politicising consequences. As such, this thesis evaluates critiques of forms of activism that involve citizenship-focused issues and engagement with the state, and hence examines the effect a relationship with the state can have upon an NGO???s work.

Thesis (D. Min.)--Ashland Theological Seminary, 2005. / Abstract. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 227-245).

Thesis (Ed. D.)--University of Toronto, 2005. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 274-312).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Toronto, 2005.

Thesis (M.S.W.)--Smith College School for Social Work, Northampton, Mass., 2007 / Thesis submitted in partial fulfillment for the degree of Master of Social Work. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 63-68).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--University of Western Sydney, 2006. / A thesis presented to the University of Western Sydney, College of Arts, School of Education, in fulfilment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (PhD). Includes bibliographies.