The chapter "Housing Conditions" examines the parameters, context and underlying causes of the degeneration of housing conditions in much of Montreal in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Much of the chapter consists of a history of the housing development during this time, with a particular focus on the inability of government authorities to positively impact the situation in terms of legislation, regulation or direct state intervention in the marketplace through the funding of housing construction. However, the author's primary argument lies in the analysis of the causes for this situation. Of course, speculation and the greed of developers, coinciding with an increase in immigrant settlement in Montreal, are cited as the direct causes of the deterioration in housing and the growth of "instant slums" in the first decades of the 20th century (70, 73). Nonetheless, the author argues that we must look beyond these causes to recognize the influence of the social and ideological context that not only allowed this situation to come about but limited efforts to achieve substantial reform of by-laws and building codes (84).
