ABSTRACT
The London Docklands redevelopment provides an extreme case of the removal of local users’ and residents’ control over the fashioning of the built environment. This chapter describes the Swedish land-development arrangements as they existed before the General Election of September 1991, which ended sixty years or so of almost continuous social democratic government. It gives a brief account of user control in the management of a co-operative block in a suburb of Orebro, a medium-sized town in central southern Sweden. Non-profit housing has formed a significant part of the Danish housing system for more than a century. The development of the Elena project is perhaps especially interesting. It is too early at the time of writing to make great claims about the success of the Advisory Program. Unfortunately improvement in the built environment on any significant scale will depend upon the development or otherwise of the general economy or upon attracting investment from foreign interests.
