Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
theme in the United States, especially during the
second half of the twentieth century. Third, the
more recent focus on the exceptional groups such
as gypsies and the sexually deviant will be
considered, and then, finally, attention is given to
the new forms of financial exclusion being
practised by organisations able to influence the
flows of funds to individuals and groups.
Table 30.2
Measures of segregation: indices of
dissimilarity in US cities, 1970-90 (black-white
segregation).
DISCRIMINATION AND
SEGREGATION IN RESIDENTIAL
AREAS
Source:
After Massey and Denton 1993.
Note:
The index of dissimilarity has a range from
0 to 100, where 100 equals totally segregated.
When Burgess (1925) proposed his concentric
model and Hoyt (1939) his sector theory of
neighbourhood change, they were both
identifying the facts of residential separation and
segregated areas. Neither focused strongly on the
meaning and significance of the processes of
discrimination and segregation that produced
these patterns. Their key assumptions were related
to the economics of land use and the power of the
bid-rent curve. The social area analysts used
segregation in more explicit ways, and the ethnic
and class 'dimensions' were central features of the
type of social area analysis developed both by
Shevky and Bell (1955) and by the legion of
factorial ecologists (see Herbert and Thomas
1997). Whereas the thrust of this form of social
geography was to identify and classify residential
areas in the city, the separate strand of social
segregation researchers, best exemplified by the
'dissimilarists' (Peach 1996; Taeuber 1988), was
concerned exclusively with racial segregation and
ethnic areas. From the studies of the social area
analysts came consistent evidence of the
dimensions that led to residential separation in
cities—social class, ethnic differences, stage in
family life cycles, migrant status, housing
conditions. From the dissimilarists came clear
statements on the extent of racial segregation and
its persistence over time. Consistently, black
Americans have the highest levels of segregation
(Massey and Denton 1993); in British cities, Peach
(1996) found evidence for change, with
Bangladeshis possessing the highest levels of
segregation, although conditions nowhere
resembled a ghetto.
Table 30.1
Measures of segregation: indices of
dissimilarity in British cities, 1991 (from white
population).
THE ETHNIC GHETTO
The term 'ghetto' is emotive but draws together
many of the significant features of discrimination
and segregation. In the literature of the social
sciences, ghetto is a racial concept. Peach (1996)
noted that the two defining conditions for a
ghetto—being dominated by a single ethnic or
racial group and containing most members of that
Source:
After Peach 1996.
Note:
The index of dissimilarity has a range from 0
to 100, where 100 equals totally segregated.
