About HIC

Habitat International Coalition (HIC) is an independent, international, non-profit alliance of some 400 organizations and individuals working in the area of human settlements. The strength of the Coalition is based on its worldwide membership that includes social movements, grassroot organizations, civil society organizations, NGOs, academia and research institutions, and like-minded individuals from 80 countries in both North and South. A shared set of objectives bind and shape HIC's commitment to communities working to secure housing and improve their habitat conditions.

HIC's Constitution sets out objectives that it pursues at local, national, regional and international levels through ever-emerging strategies and activities:

• Recognition, defence and full implementation of everyone's right everywhere to a secure place to live in peace and dignity.
• Defending the human rights of the homeless, poor and inadequately housed.

HIC reaffirmed strategic focus include:

• Developing relationships inside and outside HIC, through advocacy, promotion, facilitative, supportive and direct action; and strengthening civil society’s role in improving housing and settlement development.
• Strengthening people’s processes by supporting community based efforts to improve housing and settlements and alleviate poverty by assisting a broad range of people’s actions, addressing a set of core issues: housing, governance and poverty.
• Advocacy for recognition, defence and full implementation of housing rights, to improve the quality of life of the poor through improvement of housing conditions, in additional to income enhancement and social empowerment; and to move toward sustainable environment.

To attain these objectives, HIC works to:

• Support campaigns for housing rights & against forced evictions.
• Coordinate NGO conferences on housing and land rights.
• Develop and apply monitoring and training methods.
• Publish public information and advocacy materials.
• Provide local struggles with access to the UN human rights program and reporting mechanisms.
• Support exchanges of expertise and strategies.
• Facilitate networks and information exchanges.
• Conduct national fact-finding missions.
• Enable research and other projects.
• Support any other legal activity toward housing solutions.

Currently activities concentrate on:

• Solidarity actions for the Right to Housing.
• The global implementation of popular and democratic strategies towards the planning, financing, construction and governance of human settlements called Social Production of Habitat.
• The discussion and implementation of the Charter of the Rights to the City, which has been initiated in Latin America.
• The participation at the World Social Forum and the Regional Social Forums.
• Information and experience exchange regarding social habitat issues all over the world.

Further analysis on the Coalition and its networking activity can be find in the document What is HIC? by Enrique Ortiz.