Housing and the post-welfare patchwork of shadow care infrastructures: housing as patch and thread

This paper examines the role of housing within the tattered "patchwork" of state and non-state, formal and informal shadow care infrastructures that support the survival of low-income people in post-welfare global north cities. Drawing on interviews with care providers and recipients in two local government areas in central Western Sydney, Australia, the paper shows that housing - from social housing to informal rental - plays a central role in this patchwork of care. The findings demonstrate that housing serves as an infrastructure which facilitates self-care and care for and by others. Housing also facilitates and mediates people's access to other shadow care infrastructures that support needs such as food and disability services. When housing is inadequate, the care it facilitates can also be harmful, even while it is life sustaining. Building on these findings, we consider how the metaphors of patchwork and care infrastructures might inform critiques and new visions for post-welfare cities.