Housing as a digitalized service

The Danish WP is led by Maja de Neergaard. 2024-2029 (6 years) SEK 16 700 000 / RUC 2 500 000

Digitalization is today an integral part of how we dwell, not only because of new smart home technologies, but also because new housing developments are built with digital infrastructures and/or based on digital platform services. This project addresses the societal consequences of this type of digitalisation and explores how it is redefining how we dwell and turning housing into a digitized service.

Previous research focuses on digitalisation in relation to platforms for temporary occupancy, housing management, and user experiences in relation to energy saving technologies. While it suggests that digitalisation causes changes to the way people inhabit and occupy their dwelling, it does not engage with substantial theorisation of the emerging dwelling practices, nor do they seek to provide broader systemic explanations of the changes taking place. Also, existing research is separated between systemic and lifeworld studies.

Through combining systemic and lifeworld research, this project fills a significant knowledge gap. Among the changes caused by digitalisation is an increased formalization and commodification of the social, material, and technological orchestration that inhabitation involves. The project explores novel cases of digitalised dwelling, such as the Kaktus Towers in Copenhagen, and develops a relational perspective that combines theory of practice with political economy and integrates the analysis of the systemic and the lifeworld perspective.
 
Project team:

Guy Baeten (PI) and Carina Listerborn from Malmö University, Fredrik Torisson and Pablo Miranda from Lund University, Maja de Neergaard from Roskilde University, Maria Kaika from the University of Amsterdam and Inge Goudsmit from the Chinese University of Hong Kong.