Precarious Alternative: Lessons from parallel housing crises Part 2 Dissertation 2025 Oliver Piers University of Plymouth | UK Using Henri Lefebvre’s concept of abstract spatialisation to examine how profit-driven housing developments disrupt subcultural communities, the dissertation looks at Berlin and Amsterdam housing projects and methods and compares them with London. This is done by first outlining the socio-economic and political lineage of London housing access, from the post-war period to the present, where gentrification as state development policy epitomises the abstraction of social space. The understanding of precarious urban conditions and modes of agency has been developed through conversational interviews and anecdotal accounts. These methods were used to foreground the embodied and lived experiences of individuals who have inhabited these urban environments over time. Finally, the dissertation considers the degree to which the alternative and perhaps more radical models present in Berlin and Amsterdam could challenge housing commodification in London, while simultaneously being mindful that implementing such models in the UK is hindered by political resistance and the suppression of grassroots movements. Tutor(s) Nikolina Bobic