Stakeholders’ perspective on collaboration barriers in low-income housing provision: a case study from Pakistan

The prevailing housing situation in Pakistan is alarming, as more than 47% of urban households are estimated to be living in squatters. Housing stakeholders require an enabling environment to collaborate to reduce the drastic inequity with too many housing options for the high-income and too few for the low-income groups. Existing literature reveals that Pakistan lacks stakeholder studies with a collaborative focus on providing low-income housing in urban areas. This study explores the barriers and impediments to stakeholder collaborations in the low-income housing sector through in-depth interviews within the urban setting of Lahore, the capital and the most populous city of the biggest province, Punjab, Pakistan. The findings identify the emergence of five cross-cutting collaboration challenges (GLIPP), placing government capacity, institutional complexity, and political willpower & intervention as dominant ones. This study stresses revising the organizational hierarchy of government institutions to develop a collaborative culture in the Pakistani housing sector. As part of practical implications, this paper would agitate policymakers to develop housing policies and programs for low-income groups.