Recent single-day counts have identified more than 40,000 people experiencing homelessness in Canada, with the number of those unsheltered increasing by 88% since 2018. The unsheltered homeless, or “rough sleepers”, includes individuals and groups sleeping outside in public or semi-public spaces. While Canada recognized “mass homelessness” as a “social problem” during the latter half of the 1980s, homelessness has continued to increase in both scope and visibility since the 1990s.
These and other dimensions of the housing crisis have corresponded with a surge in homeless encampments in Canadian cities. While varying in size, organization, and structure, homeless encampments refer to “any area wherein an individual or a group of people live in homelessness together, often in tents or other temporary structures”. Encampments are often established in or near infrastructure such as abandoned buildings, overpasses, and sidewalks. Here, our focus is directed towards encampments settled in public green spaces, which include trail systems, parks, and riverbanks. Green spaces allow the unsheltered homeless to avoid criminalization from neo-vagrancy laws and find “privacy, survival, and solace” outside.
At a time when individuals and institutions are urged to “think globally, act locally” to address anthropogenic impacts on the environment, the presence of encampments in public green spaces can upset residents’ ideals relating to humans’ relationship with nature. Ecological rationalities place sweeps above dispute by framing the removal of unsheltered homeless and their belongings as necessary for protecting the environment and public health.
Writing in recognition of the interconnection between social and environmental justice, this commentary is informed by our own research with the homeless in Ontario, Canada and draws from the now-matured body of literature evidencing the counterproductive and harmful tendencies of encampment sweeps. We conclude by advocating for ecologically and socially sustainable housing solutions rooted in participatory and knowledge co-design traditions.
