ABSTRACT
Studies of private sector 'conventional', developer-built, low-middle-income housing projects in Brazil and Mexico in the early years of the twenty first century demonstrated problems created by the 'new' housing at the level of urban form and infrastructure provision and service delivery. In other cases, the construction of 'conventional' public housing continued to be the official strategic policy; 'non-conventional' sites and services projects and slum upgrading programmes and projects being treated as 'one-off', extra-ordinary, interventions. The mindset and operational systems were largely in place to revert to 'conventional' public housing provision in the 1980s and 1990s. The new generation of 'conventional' housing strategies represents a significant shift in priorities for government support to the housing sector, giving greater emphasis to the upper end of the low-income scale, rather than to the poorest urban households or those in greatest need. They are more concerned with the impact of housing markets and the construction industry on growth in national and municipal economies.
