Residential Segregation in Multiethnic Urban Environments

1
Residential Segregation in Multiethnic Urban
Environments

• Nov 28, 2007
• soc205Y

2
Today

• Discuss Paper assignment
• Email me your idea by Feb 26 for feedback, Final
  paper due April 2nd
• Lecture based on readings
• Berry and Denis The Hard and Soft Boundaries of
  Segregation Toward Integrated Theory.
• Walks and Bourne Ghettos in Canada's cities?
  Racial segregation, ethnic enclaves and poverty
  concentration in Canadian urban areas.
• Special Discussion
• Ethnic discrimination in housing How big of a
  problem in Toronto?

3
Introduction

• Canadian society is increasingly multiethnic, but
  an array of boundaries crisscross groups to
  reduce contact and harmony
• How do we characterize the boundaries between
  ethnic groups?

4
Ghettos in Canadas Cities? 1

• Are there urban ghettos in Canada?
• Operationalized here as what is the relationship
  between neighbourhood minority concentration and
  low income
• Motivation for this research
• The question is important in its own right
• Much of the research on this topic is in the
  U.S., which may not be reflective of urban Canada

5
Ghettos in Canadas Cities? 2

• The U.S. Situation
• Positive relationship as minority concentration
  in neighbourhoods increases, extent of low income
  levels (poverty) increases
• Highly segregated minority neighbourhoods in the
  U.S. limits ability to escape poverty because
• Lack of social networks
• Lack of locally based resources
• Lack of access to employment
• Does the same pattern hold for Canada?

6
Ghettos in Canadas Cities? 3

• The Canadian Situation
• There is a discourse of ghettoization
• Kazemipur and Halli (2000) argue that Canada is
  witnessing the birth of urban underclass ghettos
  directly linked to growing ethnic communities
• Examined Census data 1981-1991
• Found that immigrants from Africa, Asia, Latin
  America and the Caribbean are increasingly likely
  to live in ghetto or underclass communities.

7
Ghettos in Canadas Cities? 4

• But other Canadian studies suggest otherwise
• Ethnic and racial segregation do not mimic the
  pattern of ghettoization in the U.S. (e.g. Fong
  1996 Myles and Hou 2004).
• Which story is accurate?

8
Ghettos in Canadas Cities? 5

• The authors employ a traditional measure of
  segregation, the index of dissimilarity (DIS) to
  examine segregation trends over the period 1991
  to 2001.
• To answer the research question Is the
  concentration of visible minorities in
  majority-minority neighbourhoods associated with
  an increase in poverty, the authors look at
  changes in four basic poverty indicators
  (dependent variables).
• average household income
• incidence of low income
• unemployment level
• proportion paying more than 30 of their income
  on rent
• Minority concentrations are represented by
  polarized tracts meaning, neighborhoods which
  comprise more than 70 percent visible minorities,
  with one single group that is dominant.

9
Ghettos in Canadas Cities? 6

• Findings
• There is no clear relationship between the most
  polarized tracts and the poverty indicators.
• This suggests that high levels of racial
  concentration do not automatically imply greater
  neighborhood poverty.

10
Ghettos in Canadas Cities? 7

• So whats happening?
• The lack of relationship between minority
  concentration and poverty is EXPLAINED by the
  presence wealthy Chinese concentrations in some
  of Toronto neighbourhoods.
• This finding supports Myles and Hous (2004)
  argument that wealthy Chinese have been
  successful in their locational attainment goals
  and may be in the process of creating ethnic
  communities (instead of ghettos) in suburban
  locales in Toronto.
• But this relationship is not replicated in
  Vancouver or elsewhere, suggesting that Toronto
  might be an anomaly in this regard.

11
Ghettos in Canadas Cities? 8

• How do these findings speak to theory?
• It is the distribution of low-rent apartment
  housing (particularly the concentration of
  high-rise private rental apartments and social
  housing) and increasing affordability problems
  among new immigrants, rather than the
  concentration of visible minority populations per
  se, that are most responsible for shaping the
  pattern of neighborhood poverty, at least in the
  three largest CMAs.
• Despite more visible minorities and Aboriginals
  in Canadian urban areas, there is little evidence
  that these trends are leading towards the
  formation of ghettos.

12
Ghettos in Canadas Cities? 9

• Conclusion
• Canada is NOT like the U.S. and NOT like what
  some Canadian researchers have posited
• Questions the applicability of the discourse on
  ghettoization in the Canadian context.
• Not only is there little evidence of ghetto
  formation along U.S. lines, the neighborhoods
  closest to this concept clusters of Chinese
  majority census tracts in suburban Toronto have
  above-average incomes and rates of home
  ownership.
• Levels of segregation for most minority groups
  have declined, particularly for the two minority
  groups (blacks and Aboriginals) that were found
  to have some of the strongest associations with
  elevated low income levels and for which the
  discourse of ghettoization in Canada has most
  commonly been applied.

13
In multiethnic urban Canada, research is
increasingly focused on other forms of
segregation and separateness
14
Paradox

• Groups may be physically close in space (living
  nearby, sharing schools or workplaces) but not
  necessarily making meaningful or positive contact
• Conversely, groups that are physically distant
  and not making direct face-to-face contact may be
  integrated into societys symbolic categories,
  such as Western, middle-class, consumer, or
  patriot

15
Strategies and Counterstrategies
16
(No Transcript)
17
A multi-level typology of boundaries

• Different emphasis
• Less focused on political-state boundaries and
  boundary making processes
• Bridges several divides
• Distinguishes Situational vs. non-situational
• Distinguishes the boundaries in Internal and
  external environments
• Distinguishes both spatial and non-spatial
  boundaries
• Suggests an expanded toolbox of measurement
  strategies along with a conceptual synthesis

18
Problem 1 Different kinds of integration

• 1. Demographic/statistical
• 2. Normative
• 3. Identificational
• 4. Functional
• 5. Communicative

19
Problem 2 Different kinds of boundaries

• We reconceptualize segregation as the set of
  boundaries at macro, meso, and micro levels that
  distinguish status groups, prevent resource
  sharing among them, and limit the degree of
  social integration
• We classify boundaries by their level of analysis
  (macro, meso, micro), by their permeability (hard
  vs. soft), and by the degree to which they are
  structural or symbolic
• We describe the interrelationships among
  boundaries, and how they change over time
  boundary order vs. boundary action

20
3. The interrelationships among boundaries

• Understanding segregation requires describing not
  just the boundary order, but the continual
  interaction between action and order at
  boundaries

21
Other recent ideas

• Tilly (2004) on boundary mechanisms
• Social boundaries interrupt, divide,
  circumscribe, or segregate distributions of
  population or activity within social fields
• Precipitants (causes) of boundary change
  encounter, imposition, borrowing, conversation,
  incentive shift
• Constituents of boundary change
  inscription-erasure, activation-deactivation,
  site transfer, relocation
• Consequences e.g., escalation of conflict
  through attack-defense sequences ethnic
  cleansing

22
(No Transcript)
23
Expanded toolbox of measurement strategies

• Demographic indices
• Historical-comparative research
• Systematic social observation
• In-depth interviewing and ethnography
• Experimental vignettes
• Tertiary street networks
• Etc.

24
(No Transcript)
25
Key Points

• Groups may be physically close in space, but not
  necessarily making meaningful contact or feeling
  connected to each other
• Conversely, groups may be integrated into
  societys softer categories or engaged in
  meaningful dialogue in virtual space, but not
  necessarily living nearby or exchanging economic
  resources
• Different kinds of integration
  demographic/statistical, normative, functional,
  communicative, etc.