Webinar – Exchanging Futures: International Perspectives on Housing Commons

The Housing Commons Research Centre, an initiative of the New Housing Alternatives Partnership (NHA), invites NHA partners and guests to a virtual webinar that brings together community-led housing movements from Canada and Uganda.

Format: Zoom

Register on Eventbrite

Housing struggles are often framed as local or national crises, but community-led housing movements around the world have long been developing collective responses grounded in care, land stewardship, and shared governance.

Exchanging Futures: International Perspectives on Housing Commons brings together partners from Canada and Uganda participating in an international knowledge exchange program facilitated by Rooftops Canada. Rooftops Canada is the executing agency for the Women’s Spaces Project (2022–2027), in partnership with the Government of Canada. The project involves significant knowledge sharing and co-learning activities with Canadian and international housing sector professionals.

Centering the experiences of women-led housing initiatives, this webinar explores how community-based housing practices are shaped by history, culture, and place, and how international partnerships can support learning beyond Western and Eurocentric models.

The conversation will foreground work emerging from Uganda through the Women’s Spaces Project, with reflections from Canadian partners engaged in reciprocal learning and collaboration. Together, panelists will discuss:

• How women-led and community-based housing movements secure land, housing, and livelihoods;
• What international knowledge exchange looks like in practice, including its possibilities and challenges;
• How housing commons models can support both personal and collective liberation; and
• Why looking beyond familiar Western frameworks is necessary for building equitable housing futures.

Introductory remarks contextualizing Rooftops Canada and the Women’s Spaces Project will be offered by Genevieve Drouin and Efemena Ozouga, followed by a panel discussion featuring Dorothy Baziwe, Dr. Peter Kasaija, and Alia Abaya.

This webinar is part of the Housing Commons Research Centre (HCRC) Webinar Series, which brings researchers, practitioners, organizers, and students into conversation around community-led housing strategies across contexts.

Speaker Bios

Genevieve Drouin (Rooftops Canada)
As CEO of Rooftops Canada, Genevieve brings experience in cooperative housing, sustainable cities, and inclusive human settlements across Africa, Latin America, the Caribbean, and Canada. Rooftops Canada is the executing agency for the Women’s Spaces Project (2022–2027), which supports gender-responsive land rights and community-led housing in Angola, Kenya, South Africa, and Uganda.

Efemena Ozouga (Rooftops Canada)
Efemena is a leader with over a decade of experience advancing human rights, gender equity, inclusive governance, and housing justice. A lawyer by training, she bridges legal frameworks, strategic partnerships, and community-driven approaches to foster transformative and equitable systems. She is currently Program Manager at Rooftops Canada, with a focus on land and housing rights and feminist programming.

Dorothy Baziwe (Shelter and Settlements Alternative, Uganda)
Dorothy is Executive Director of Shelter and Settlements Alternative (SSA). A social worker by profession, she has worked in Uganda’s human settlements sector since 2012, engaging in housing development, advocacy, policy engagement, research, and collaboration to improve service delivery for vulnerable households.

Dr. Peter Kasaija (Urban Action Lab, Makerere University, Kampala)
Peter has more than 15 years of teaching and research experience in urban development and environmental change. His research interests include urban informality, housing, inequality, poverty, climate change adaptation, and inclusive governance and planning. He has engaged in numerous international academic and research partnerships.

Alia Abaya (Circle Community Land Trust, Toronto)
Alia is CEO of Circle Community Land Trust, where she is building a city-wide nonprofit housing provider. Her work integrates community development, social finance, sustainability, and cross-sector partnerships, including stewardship of over 600 family homes and a $72M capital repair program to protect affordability in perpetuity.