Including the Most Excluded? A Qualitative Study on the Address Registration for People Experiencing Homelessness in Belgium

• Published date: 01 July 2023
• DOI: http://doi.org/10.1177/00953997231162538
• Author: Laure-lise Robben,Griet Roets,Martin Wagener,Wim Van Lancker,Koen Hermans
• Date: 01 July 2023
• Subject Matter: Articles

https://doi.org/10.1177/00953997231162538

Administration & Society

2023, Vol. 55(6) 1093 –1117

© The Author(s) 2023

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DOI: 10.1177/00953997231162538

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Article

Including the Most

Excluded? A Qualitative

Study on the Address

Registration for

People Experiencing

Homelessness in Belgium

Laure-lise Robben1, Griet Roets2,

Martin Wagener3, Wim Van Lancker1, and

Koen Hermans1

Abstract

In many European countries, one needs a permanent address to be entitled

to social rights. To address this minimum prerequisite, mechanisms for

administrative inclusion are in place for persons experiencing homelessness,

such as the reference address in Belgium. This paper disentangles the non-

take-up mechanisms behind this reference address by drawing on interviews

with professionals. Our evidence suggests this is a minimum minimorum

of social protection, albeit it can reflect and reinforce exclusion of the

beneficiaries. This article contributes to the debate on the entitlement and

non-take-up of rights, and the possibility of an administrative address that

includes the most excluded.

Keywords

administrative exclusion, social exclusion, homelessness, non-take-up, social

rights

1KU Leuven, Belgium

2University of Ghent, Belgium

3UCLouvain, Belgium

Corresponding Author:

Laure-lise Robben, LUCAS, Centre for Care Research and Consultancy and Centre for

Sociological Research, KU Leuven, Minderbroedersstraat 8, Leuven 3000, Belgium.

Email: laurelise.robben@kuleuven.be

1162538AAS0010.1177/00953997231162538Administration & SocietyRobben et al.

research-article2023

1094 Administration & Society 55(6)

Introduction

In many European countries, obtaining and exerting rights and services starts

with registration in the national register (European Commission, 2019a).

These civil registries have been essential to govern societies (e.g., Frohman,

2018)- initially to identify citizens for purposes of taxation and military con-

scription, and, with the expansion of welfare states, also for determining

one’s eligibility for social rights and benefits. To date, this civil registration is

a minimum prerequisite to gain access to social rights and services. In its

absence, “one does not exist” because one cannot fully participate in eco-

nomic, civil and political society (Prescott, 2015). Consequently, a civil reg-

istry has become, besides a source of information, an instrument for inclusion

and exclusion (Peeters & Widlak, 2018). However, “invisible” or “hidden”

persons, such as persons experiencing homelessness (PEH), prove to be a

difficult fit for the criteria of the registry (Glasser et al., 2014) and are not

officially registered. This is problematic, because being administratively

excluded induces the exclusion from social rights and services (Peeters &

Widlak, 2018). Specifically for PEH, losing one’s permanent address leads to

the vicious cycle that has come to be known as the “Postal Paradox”: having

no address keeps PEH homeless because access to social rights and services

is restricted (Byrne, 2018).

To address this minimum prerequisite, different policy responses present

an alternative to guarantee administrative anchorage for PEH, such as the

“ProxyAddress” in the United Kingdom, fictitious addresses in Italy, the

“Address Point” provided by the postal service in Ireland, the “Main residence

confirmation” in Austria, and the letter address in the Netherlands (Crepaldi,

2019; FEANTSA, 2018). In this paper, we shed light on one specific case: the

reference address for PEH in Belgium. This key policy highlights what we

describe as the minimum minimorum of access to social rights for PEH. The

reference address was initially designed for PEH to facilitate access to social

protection schemes, yet, over the years, poverty organizations raised concerns

on its limited access and the overall effectiveness in including its target group

(e.g., BAPN, 2019; Combat Poverty Service, 2018; Netwerk Tegen Armoede,

2017). Annually, it is estimated that 75,000 persons in Belgium are not offi-

cially registered. Accordingly, if this reference address is not accessible for

whom it was designed for, it fails to fulfill its aim. This study therefore empiri-

cally explores the determinants and mechanisms underlying in the non-take-

up (NTU) of this reference address. In this context, NTU refers to the

phenomenon that persons or households do not claim or do not receive bene-

fits or services they are legally entitled to (van Oorschot, 1994). Despite the

extensive literature on NTU of rights and assistance in welfare states, research