Symposium cooperative conditions

Symposium Cooperative Conditions / learning from Vienna, Zürich and Munich Thursday 6 October 2022, 9.30- 17.30 h Rotterdam, Keilepand, Keilestraat 9

Furthering the call of the publication ‘Operatie Wooncoöperatie’, we cordially invite you to the international symposium ‘Cooperative Conditions, Learning from Vienna, Zürich & Munich’.

The symposium in Keilepand, Rotterdam will feature key persons in the culture of building and housing production in Vienna, Zürich and Munich. Cities that are characterized by innovative architecture, affordable and innovative forms of living together, effective regulations and policy instruments. The symposium explores the successes of cooperative self-organization of citizens. It celebrates its architecture and realizations, but explicitly from the perspective of the institutional and municipal conditions that are necessary to accomplish this: cooperative conditions.

These three cities all have a strong history of affordable housing and citizen-owned cooperatives. All three also have borne witness to a thriving and expanding cooperative sector, contributing to the quality and affordability of urban living. Not the individual question of “how do I want to live?”, but jointly shaping the question “how do we want to live together?” is defining the cooperative model. Housing is a fundamental right, not a commodity. Citizens can shape it together.

We look into how each city has shaped its own conditions for this cooperative housing. In all three places we find a shared understanding and a mutual recognition between the urban institutions and citizens initiatives. In the morning session, a series of three lectures builds understanding of the context of each city. In the afternoon session, three parallel worktables allow a deeper understanding via the stories of concrete projects, and how they in turn shape conditions and context.

The symposium challenges participants to find patterns and translate these to conditions for our own cities and the Dutch context. We invite all who are drafting the agenda for the next four years – be it as politicians, as policy makers, as banks, as contractors or as developers, architects and activists. The housing crisis is an urgent challenge for new city administrations everywhere. Cooperatives are increasingly recognized as a fundamental and viable answer to the challenges that the housing crisis presents. This symposium invites us to take the next step: how can we prepare the ground and demand and shape cooperative conditions together?

Program outline

9.00 Registration

9.30 Welcome and introduction, Arie Lengkeek & Peter Kuenzli

Morning program: 3 cities, 3 perspectives

• 10.00 Munich: Munich Mule – Recipe, Ingredients and Flavors of the Affordable Housing Mix in Munich Munich has a very clear policy on housing: affordability first. This translates to a policy on land and a very clear idea of a segmented market, combining land value with rental levels and subsidies for special needs and vulnerable groups. Housing cooperatives are natural partners in this policy. How they find their place in the Munich Mix will be told by Martin Klamt, Wohnungsbaumanager & Wachstumsstrategien, Landeshauptstadt Munich

10.45 Coffee break

• 11.15 Zürich: Typologies for a changing society - challenges for old and new cooperatives Zürich has a long tradition in cooperative housing, with a recent upsurge. How these old and new cooperatives create new modes of living together, supported by city, funds and banks, is told by Claudia Thiesen, initiator and board member of groundbreaking coops such as Mehr Als Wohnen and Kraftwerk.

• 12.00 Vienna: Alliances for agency and self-control - cooperative housing and social sustainability Ranking among the most livable cities in the world, Vienna is exceptional for its large not-for-profit and social housing stock. Affordability is not the first issue here, rather the question: how to shape housing, urban living and working together? How to organize agency as citizens? Robert Korab has worked on this in various positions, from the foundational Sargfabrik to the recent cooperative developer DieWogen.

12.45 Lunch

13.45 Parallel sessions: three worktables

Conversations with cooperatives, architects and policy-makers from each city, starting from a concrete project. The lecturers from the morning session will join these tables as well.

• Worktable Zürich: Typologies for a changing society - challenges for old and new cooperatives with Jonathan Kischkel, Co-Präsident Kalkbreite, starting from the project Zollhaus, focusing on the culture of competitions, the process from definition, design and appropriation, negotiating between new typologies and building regulations. Moderator: Anne Kockelkorn, assistant professor Dwelling, TU Delft, initiator of www.cooperativeconditions.net

• Worktable Munich: The Affordable Housing Mix in Munich: on land, affordability and the economy of the cooperative with Christian Hadaller, KOOGRO / Kooperative Grossstadt, starting from the project San Riemo, focusing on the definition of the project in relation to the Munich Wohnpolitik / Münchner Mischung, economy and financing of the cooperative, challenges for new projects. Moderator: Darinka Czischke, associate professor Housing TU Delft, initiator Project Together

• Worktable Vienna: Alliances for agency and self-control - cooperative housing and social sustainability with Katharina Bayer, einszueins archiktektur, Vienna, starting from the projects: Gleis21 and Wohnproject Wien, focusing on the social practice of a community and alliances for realization, putting Baugruppen, not-for-profit developers and the cooperative model in perspective. Moderator: Ana Dzokic, principal Stealth Unlimited, Rotterdam/Belgrade

15.45 Tea break

16.15 Closing session with Dutch experts

• Anne Kockelkorn, Darinka Czischke, and Ana Dzokic will share the cooperative conditions that were formulated at the worktables; reaction and reflection by Dutch experts in housing, finance, politics: with a.o. Desiree Uitzetter (BPD, chair Neprom), Derk Loorbach (DRIFT, curator IABR), Arjen Gielen (SVN fonds), Aart Cooiman (Rabobank).

17.15 Drinks

The program expands on the book Operatie Wooncooperatie, uit de wooncrisis door gemeenschappelijk bezit, by Arie Lengkeek & Peter Kuenzli, published by trancityxvaliz Registration: You must register and you’re kindly asked to buy a ticket for your lunch when registering Entrance: The symposium itself is free of charge, but we charge participants € 16.92 ( € 15,00 + 1,92 service costs and VAT) for lunch at Het Keilepand Tickets: Buy your tickets via this link

**If you’d like to participate but the costs are an obstacle, please contact alengkeek{at} gmail.com

Colophon Program curated by Arie Lengkeek and Peter Kuenzli in a joint organization with: AIR, Keile Collectief, IABR and trancityxvaliz publishers.

Cooperative Conditions is also the title of the research and exhibition on Zürich by Anne Kockelkorn, Rebekka Hirschberg & Susanne Schindler, which will also be featured in the symposiuml. See: www.cooperativeconditions.net

The symposium is made possible by the generous support of

The municipality of Rotterdam,

BPD ontwikkeling and Rabobank