European Union Housing Policy—An Attempt to Synthesize the Actions Taken
Round 1
Reviewer 1 Report
This is a nice analysis of the EU documents and previous research on enhancing housing rights in the EU. The overall aims of the paper are achieved nicely. The article presents a nice overview of various policies developed by the EU to incorporate housing issues into the European Housing policy. It is an important contribution and timely. The housing issues are becoming increasingly important around the EU due to increased migration, economic crisis and so on.
I suggest only English language editing to make this paper easier to read as some sentences were not very clear and too long.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer thank you for your positive evaluation of our article and for considering its topic as valuable and interesting.
In line with your recommendation: I suggest only English language editing to make this paper easier to read as some sentences were not very clear and too long.,
Response
We have once again checked the linguage and grammatical correctness by a professional English translator.
We hope that these improvements will make the article easier to read.
Reviewer 2 Report
As a ‘review’ article, this study is well organized and it presents meaningful issues. However, please specify the analysis of previous studies dealing with similar topics and the differences from those papers.
Author Response
Dear Reviewer , thank you for your positive evaluation of our article and for considering its topic as valuable and interesting. In line with your recommendation,
“…… please specify the analysis of previous studies dealing with similar topics and the differences from those papers “
in the introduction to the article, the literature review was extended and additional publications devoted to the issues of European housing policy were cited.
Thank you for this valuable comment. We hope that these additions ( red font in the paper) will meet your expectations and will be considered sufficient.
Reviewer 3 Report
The article deals with a very interesting topic. Housing policy is one of the main social policies in every EU country. According to the authors, the aim of the article is, inter alia: "to indicate the premises behind expanding EU policy to include the precisely defined housing issue ...", however, the conclusion can be read that such a policy is not needed as a separate policy, due to too great legislative differences and cultural traditions. So maybe it is worth rewriting the aim of the study?
In my opinion, the article does not contain an analysis of social policy in terms of the existence and distribution of social housing. There is a postulate regarding the lower energy consumption of the existing and new buildings. However, an important part of a sustainable policy is the judicious placement of social housing in the urban fabric so as not to create districts / neighborhoods of dysfunctional communities. I propose to add this issue.
Author Response
Dear Reviwer ,thank you for your positive evaluation of our article and for considering its topic as valuable and interesting. In line with your following recommendations :
- So maybe it is worth rewriting the aim of the study?
- In my opinion, the article does not contain an analysis of social policy in terms of the existence and distribution of social housing. There is a postulate regarding the lower energy consumption of the existing and new buildings.
- However, an important part of a sustainable policy is the judicious placement of social housing in the urban fabric so as not to create districts / neighborhoods of dysfunctional communities. I propose to add this issue.
We have introduced the following corrections and additions to the article (red font in the new version of the article):
- The aim of the article has been reformulated to be more consistent with the scope of the analysis and the main conclusions.
- Chapter 4 was supplemented with the issues of European urban policy and the importance of an inclusive housing policy in the process of counteracting social exclusion, supporting the integration of urban communities and improving the quality of life of inhabitants was emphasized.
- In subchapter 5.4. the catalogue of the EU instruments of influence on the national housing policy of an environmental nature was expanded.
Thank you once more for the valuable comments. We hope that these improvements will meet your expectations and will be considered sufficient.
