Commentary: The counter-reformation that failed? A commentary on the mixed legacy of supported housing.

The articles in this special section rejoin a conversation about the terms and conditions of social participation that was suspended some time ago. While welcoming the move, this commentary raises some questions about the vehicle. The formidable achievements of supported housing notwithstanding, it still functions as an abeyance mechanism ensuring its occupants a kind of sheltered livelihood. Arguably, then, the larger social questions gathered under the encompassing terms of social inclusion and citizenship will not be fully addressed, and may be occluded, either by declaring supported housing a forward operating base of recovery or by rewriting its original remit as an undeclared experiment in reintegration. To extend its promise will mean first confronting the purposes served by supported housing, by design or default, in its present configuration.