Campaigning for adequate shelter for all

Beginning at the United Nations Conference on Human Settlements (Habitat Conference) in Vancouver in 1976, and formulated by both the International Year of Shelter for the Homeless (IYSH – 1987) and the Global Strategy for Shelter to the Year 2000 (GSS), the process of raising awareness and political will for the creation of efficient and effective strategies of housing for all was brought into focus again by the Second Habitat Conference (Habitat II) in Istanbul in 1996. The Global Plan of Action produced by the conference is yet another blueprint for setting the standards required for national action and international cooperation towards housing for all as a global development goal. The question is yet again whether the required political will can be sustained during the years following the Conference.