By Petar Atanacković
On April 27, 2024, Petar Atanackovic presented the work of the Project House Potsdam and the Association INWOLE in Cooperativa Minga’s space in Montemor-o-Novo, Portugal.
Credits for images: DASH project 2024
The Association INWOLE and the Project House Potsdam held their presentation in Cooperativa Minga Integra’s space l in Montemor-o-Novo. Fifteen members and collaborators of the cooperative had an opportunity to talk to Petar Atanackovic, member of both INWOLE and Project House, and to find out more about the housing crisis in Germany, as well as about ongoing co-housing projects – and specifically, about the Mietshäuser Syndikat’s ownership model and other projects of the Project House Potsdam.
Participants heard about the establishment of co-housing projects and their development, as well as the diverse challenges they face in terms of everyday management – challenges related to funding and spatial development, but also to their governance model and group dynamics. And what we concluded, at the end of this very fruitful discussion and inspiring comparison of experiences, was that cooperatives, co-housing projects, and all other similar initiatives and organisations share very similar experiences in regard to the challenges they are facing.
The issues are pretty much the same wherever you look, and people are trying to solve them in a very similar manner. In other words, the participants realised that they are not alone in facing wicked problems, and they are thus part of a wider community even if they often do not realise this. This was a very encouraging and motivating finding!
