HOUSING SYSTEMS EAST AND WEST — THE USES AND LIMITATIONS OF COMPARATIVE STUDIES

Comparative studies of social policy in general, and housing is no exception, are always fraught with difficulties. There are very few attempts which entirely manage to escape both of the major traps. On the one hand is the danger of drifting into an abstract empiricism which can end up concentrating on such factors as the details of subsidy systems or the precise percentages of income which people pay for housing in various countries. At best this becomes numbingly boring and at worst (for example where payment or subsidy figures are described in local currency terms without indicating exchange rates) incomprehensible.