Interview with Eric Tars, National Law Center on Homelessness & Poverty
I really do think of homeless persons in the U.S. as being internal refugees, people who are fleeing economic hardships, not necessarily war, but the conditions that they face in many cases are similar to conditions that face refugee populations. Part of the connection to the work that I’m trying to share is the sense that, similar to refugee populations, these are people who did not choose to be in this situation.
–Eric Tars
Is housing a human right? Most definitely. Housing has served as a primary driver of the U.S. economy for over a decade, yet funding for government supported housing has plummeted. Human rights require that housing be treated as a social good and not just a market commodity. Protections in housing are enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (Art. 25), the International Covenant on Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights (Art. 11), and the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Racial Discrimination (Art. 5).
In the U.S., less than 3 percent of housing is public housing — and even those meager facilities are under threat. The economic crisis is also pushing more people into homelessness.
Eric Tars is the Director of Human Rights at the National Law Center on Homelessness and Poverty. He is considered by his peers to be one of the foremost human rights activists working within the United States today. He’s on the front lines of the battle to realize housing as a human right and spoke with us about how literature has helped inspire him.
Looks like Mr. Tars is doing great work. I liked hearing about his love for books and I have a new perspective on homeless people.