The Anti-Colonial Tenant Movement in Canada

Today I talked to Ricardo Tranjan about his book The Tenant Class (Between the Lines, 2023).

It’s well known and almost taken for granted that we live in the midst of a “housing crisis”—soaring rent, persistently low vacancy rate, and deteriorating quality of existing housing stock plague renters throughout Canada. But if a crisis is defined by being sudden and often short-term, by being largely incidental and without malicious intent, and by a tendency to produce broad social solidarity, Ricardo Tranjan argues that the present housing situation is anything but a “crisis.” Instead, Tranjan persuasively shows that what the tenant class—those who must rent living space from those who own it—are facing are heightened conditions of exploitation. More than this, though, Tranjan also shows how tenants are organizing in solidarity with one another and against the landlords who profit off their very existence. Towards the end of the episode, Tranjan shines a spot light on two tenant organizing campaigns in Toronto, listeners can learn more and support these tenants by following these links: York South Weston Tenant Union at 33 King Street and Thorncliffe Park Tenants’ Rent Strike: 

Phil Henderson is a SSHRC Postdoctoral Research Fellow at Carleton University’s Institute of Political Economy where his research interests focus on the interrelations between Indigenous land/water defenders and organized labour in what’s presently known as Canada. More information can be found at his personal website.

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