Residential Segregation

STATE OF THE UNION head 65 residential segregation The Stanford Center on Poverty and Inequality BY DANIEL T. LICHTER, DOMENICO PARISI, HELGA DE VALK he United States is a nation of cultural unity, and assimilation.2 More- KEY FINDINGS Timmigrants. More than 1 million over, the current European refugee • Although there are large foreign-born U.S. residents each year crisis caused by the massive popula- differences in the sizes become legal permanent residents, tion exodus from war-torn Syria is only of minority populations nearly 60 percent of whom eventually the latest of several previous examples in Europe and the U.S., attain citizenship.1 In stark contrast, (e.g., Somalia, Kosovo). Some European there nevertheless is rather most European countries have had a countries, facing massive new immigra- remarkable similarity in long history of exporting population. tion for the first time, have looked to macro-segregation across countries in Europe and During the 18th and early 19th centu- the U.S. for answers, hoping to learn states in the U.S. ries, the U.S. was a major destination important lessons that might ease the • The magnitude of minority for European émigrés from Ireland, Ger- difficulties associated with growing segregation in new U.S. many, Italy, Scandinavia, and elsewhere. diversity and mounting ethnic and reli- gateway cities is much Today, the U.S. remains the world’s lead- gious conflict.3 greater than in European ing immigrant-receiving country, but the cities experiencing recent massive flow from Europe overall has Here, we start with a straightforward immigrant growth. ended, replaced by new arrivals from assumption: The extent to which minor- • Segregation often overlaps Asia, Latin America, and sub-Saharan ity populations (including immigrants) with many other place-based Africa. The historical record in the U.S. share the same spatial and social inequalities—poverty, unem- not only highlights the ebb and flow of spaces provides tangible, albeit indi- ployment, crime, and housing quality and overcrowding. immigration but also reveals the cultural rect, evidence of integration or spatial These overlapping disadvan- conflicts and political unrest created assimilation. Specifically, we compare tages are seemingly much by new ethnic and racial divisions and recent patterns of minority group seg- more common in the U.S. uneven integration among new immi- regation in the U.S. and Europe. At a than in European countries, grant populations. minimum, declining residential segrega- where government efforts to promote integration (e.g., tion suggests that minority populations social and mixed-income Indeed, immigration reform, affirma- are increasingly able to afford to live in housing) provide a clear tive action, ethnic profiling, and the new the same neighborhoods or commu- contrast to the market-driven racial re-concentration of urban pov- nities as natives and that they are not solutions preferred in the U.S. erty (e.g., Ferguson, East Baltimore, limited by housing market discrimina- • Policy choices will affect and North Charleston) continue to be tion. Perhaps most importantly, declines whether segregation in politically charged issues, as the 2016 in segregation indicate that majority ethnic communities or presidential election tells us. Interest- and minority populations may increas- neighborhoods represents a way station or platform for ingly enough, in some ways Europe ingly prefer (or are indifferent to) living full integration or a chronic or today is not unlike the U.S. a century together in the same communities or permanent social condition ago or more. For much of Europe, the neighborhoods, where they increasingly that institutionalizes majority- recent influx of immigrants, coupled with share the same cultural values, national minority social and economic unprecedented labor mobility within the identity, and education. Residential inequality. European Union (i.e., the Schengen integration suggests a breakdown or Agreement), has raised new questions diminution of majority-minority social about national identity (and allegiance), and economic boundaries. PATHWAYS • The Poverty and Inequality Report 2016 66 residential segregation Of course, country-to-country differences in data collec- which presumably eases the integration process. Moreover, tion and measurement, including differences in ethnic and unlike the case in the U.S., where roughly one-quarter of all racial identification and geography, make strict compari- foreign-born residents are unauthorized (and highly segre- sons of minority residential segregation difficult. We focus gated in minority communities), the immigrants in Europe are our attention on perhaps the most important axes of minor- more often legal residents. More reliable, inexpensive, and ity spatial differentiation: ethnoracial background in the U.S. extensive citywide systems of public transportation in Europe and immigration (citizenship status and foreign origin are have had the effect of dispersing low-income and immigrant used) in Europe. In doing so, we identify the main group that populations more widely throughout the metropolitan region is regarded as the “other” in each society and then compute and beyond. segregation indices relative to the “other-nonother” distinc- tion. Of course, current and past immigration and growing On the other hand, the recent rise of nationalist political parties racial and ethnic diversity are highly interrelated, both in and the right-wing backlash against immigrant populations Europe and the U.S. For example, the large majority of Ameri- in France, the Netherlands, Hungary, and Sweden, among can Asians and Hispanics are first- or second-generation others, indicate perhaps even greater antipathy toward immi- immigrants; most arrived after 1965 with the enactment of the grants than in the U.S. Integrating non-Christian immigrant Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965 (sometimes known minorities—especially Muslims from Africa, the Middle East, as the Hart-Celler Act). Moreover, racial minorities account for and Southeast Asia—also sometimes represent a larger polit- only about 20 percent of all third-generation Americans (i.e., ical problem and a different set of issues regarding integration native-born of native-born citizens).4 and national identity than the case in the U.S., which has a long history of incorporating religious minorities and of extol- Our fundamental goal is to document patterns of U.S. eth- ling religious freedom. noracial segregation across all 50 states, 3,100 counties, and select metropolitan or big-city populations (i.e., those with Residential Segregation: Some Empirical Results recent influxes of new immigration and that are comparable Our empirical approach differentiates between macro- and to their European counterparts). These estimates are juxta- micro-segregation.6 By macro-segregation, we mean the posed with patterns in Europe, where our analyses focus on spatial concentration of minority populations over European the changing distribution of immigrant patterns in 26 countries countries and over U.S. states. Macro-segregation also is (in the European Union), 1,396 county equivalents (so-called revealed empirically by the uneven distribution of minority NUTS categories),5 and several illustrative metropolitan populations over counties (or county-equivalent units) in each immigrant gateways. We focus on Amsterdam, Rotterdam, European country and each U.S. state. In contrast, micro- Brussels, and London, but also draw on other recent case segregation refers to differences in the spatial distribution studies of neighborhood segregation in the United Kingdom, of minority and majority population across neighborhoods in France, Germany, Spain, and Italy. specific cities (i.e., census tracts in U.S. cities and districts within European cities). Estimates of macro- and micro-seg- Why Segregation in the U.S. and Europe May Be regation are measured by D (i.e., the index of dissimilarly), Different which indicates the percentage of minorities that would Whether new racial and ethnic minority immigrants—both in have to move to another county (or neighborhood) in order the U.S. and Europe—will become fully integrated into major- to achieve similar percentages of minorities across all coun- ity society is far from clear. On the one hand, Europe’s more ties (or neighborhoods) in the country (or city). D varies from generous social policy regime (e.g., integrated social housing 0 (i.e., no segregation) to 100 (i.e., complete segregation of and generous welfare programs) may provide a hedge against minorities). For additional details about data and measure- high rates of residential segregation while even promoting ment, see the Appendix “Measuring Segregation.” greater minority integration, unlike the market-driven housing in the U.S. Compared to those in the U.S., immigrant and Macro-Segregation: The Big Picture of Minority racial and ethnic minority populations in Europe are typically Population Concentration much smaller in size (absolutely and relative) and less diverse, We begin by providing county-level maps of the ethnora- and are therefore perhaps less “threatening” to native popula- cial and immigrant populations in the U.S. (Figure 1) and tions. Europe arguably has fewer major immigrant “gateways,” Europe (Figure 2), respectively. We distinguish counties by and each country, unlike the U.S., tends to be dominated by a whether the percentage minority is above the U.S. and Euro- comparatively small number

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