ABSTRACT
The relation between spaces of dependence and spaces of engagement is a contingent matter. In the case of the community builders the Federal Housing Administration clearly had a national space of dependence in mind and was interested in promoting its interest in boosting the demand for housing in the United States. Local politics appears as metropolitan, regional, national or even international as different organizations try to secure those networks of associations through which respective projects can be realized. Changing economic geographies at more global scales threaten the realization of the local interests. The Conservative Party has tended to do especially well in the South and in rural areas and Labor less badly in the North and in urban areas. But the one which seems to fit the empirical materials most convincingly emphasizes the increasing importance of local labor and housing markets as bases for political mobilization and particularly, of course, for home owners.
