Call for Papers for the 2025 International Conference on Urban Affairs – Triangulating the Urban-H (Housing, Heat, Health) in Cities Session

When: April 15-19, 2025
Where: Sheraton Vancouver Wall Centre, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada
Organizers: Loretta Lees, Professor of Sociology, and Stephanie Ettinger de Cuba, Research Associate Professor of Health Law, Policy and Management, Initiative on Cities, Boston University

If interested in being a part of this session, please email your name, institution, paper title, and short abstract to Loretta Lees at llees@bu.edu and/or Stephanie Ettinger de Cuba at sedc@bu.edu.

In 2023, the UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Adequate Housing warned of a global housing crisis in which millions struggled to access safe, secure, and habitable housing. That same year, heat records were broken on all continents, and the world saw the highest global temperatures in over 100,000 years. The frequency, duration, and intensity of heatwaves are expected to increase. Individuals living within urban heat islands are more vulnerable to heat than outside. High temperatures can exacerbate already present negative physical health effects, especially for vulnerable groups, including young children, older adults, and those with chronic conditions. Exposure to extreme heat, especially during heatwaves, can also have detrimental effects on mental health. The quality and stability of housing play a crucial role in mitigating or worsening the effects of extreme heat on physical and mental health; living in substandard or unaffordable housing heightens the impact on health.

Socioeconomic stressors associated with housing displacements and insecurity, such as financial strain, social isolation, and disruption in healthcare access, can compound extreme heat’s impact on mental well-being. The proposed session seeks papers that explicitly triangulate research, policy, and/or practice on housing. As climate change and the housing crisis worsen worldwide, the public health impacts will undoubtedly be severe. We feel that this triangulation is critical going forward.