ABSTRACT

Like many edited collections, this book arose from a conference, in this case held over a five-day period in July 1991 at Fitzwilliam College, Cambridge. Unlike most such books, however, this one was not a predetermined product anticipated by the organizers, nor was its central theme-methodology for land and housing markets-a priority item on the meeting’s agenda when it began. Rather, the issue had been relegated to a half-day session as a prelude to the final plenary. The importance of methodology only emerged during the course of the substantive discussions, and came to the fore when we began to draw together our conclusions for the Fitzwilliam Memorandum (1991). Most of those who attended the meeting agreed that there was no real need nor justification for the publication of yet another collection on low-income housing in lessdeveloped countries, not even one dealing specifically with many of the complex and fascinating issues related to land markets and land prices that we had debated at length. However, we were all excited about the need for a volume that got experienced researchers to think about the ways in which the methodology they adopted shaped their analysis of the land and housing market problem and how it drew them into a particular framework and orthodoxy of conclusions and policy prescriptions. A book that sought to totally recast our pre-prepared papers, pushing the substantive detail into the background while bringing to the fore an account of the methods and approaches used, would be worthwhile and new indeed. That is how this book was conceived.