scholarly journals Did Residential Racial Segregation in the U.S. Really Increase? An Analysis Accounting for Changes in Racial Diversity

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Benjamin Elbers
Keyword(s):  
Metropolitan Areas ◽  
Racial Segregation ◽  
Racial Diversity ◽  
Major Question ◽  
Racial Residential Segregation ◽  
Information Index ◽  
Decomposition Procedure ◽  
Sociological Literature ◽  
Blacks And Whites ◽  
The U.S

A recent study by UC Berkeley's Othering & Belonging Institute (Menendian, Gailes, and Gambhir 2021) came to an astonishing conclusion: Of large metropolitan areas in the U.S., 81% have become more segregated over the period 1990-2019. This finding contradicts the recent sociological literature on changes in segregation in the U.S., which has generally found that racial residential segregation has slowly declined since the 1970s, especially between Blacks and Whites. The major question then is: What accounts for this difference? This paper answers this question in two parts. First, it shows that the preferred segregation measure of the Berkeley study, the “Divergence Index” (Roberto 2015), is identical to the Mutual Information Index M (Theil and Finizza 1971; Mora and Ruiz-Castillo 2009; Mora and Ruiz-Castillo 2011), a measure that is mechanically affected by changes in racial diversity. Given that the U.S. has become more diverse over the period 1990 to 2019, it is not surprising that this index shows increases in segregation. Second, by making use of a decomposition procedure developed in Elbers (2021), the paper shows that once the changes in segregation are decomposed into components that account for the changing racial diversity of the U.S., the findings are in line with the sociological literature. Residential racial segregation as a whole has declined modestly in most metropolitan areas of the U.S., although segregation has increased slightly when focusing on Asian Americans and Hispanics.

scholarly journals Racial residential segregation and economic disparity jointly exacerbate the COVID-19 fatality in large American cities

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Qinggang Yu ◽  
Cristina Salvador ◽  
Irene Melani ◽  
Martha Berg ◽  
Enrique Neblett ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Income Inequality ◽  
Residential Segregation ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Metropolitan Areas ◽  
Policy Implications ◽  
Current Evidence ◽  
Structural Inequality ◽  
Racial Residential Segregation ◽  
Economic Disparity ◽  
The U.S

The disproportionately high rates of both infections and deaths of underprivileged racial minorities in the U.S. (including Blacks and Hispanics) during the current COVID-19 pandemic show that structural inequality can be lethal. However, the nature of this structural inequality is poorly understood. Here, we hypothesized that two structural features of urban areas in the U.S. (racial residential segregation and income inequality) contribute to numerous health-compromising conditions, which, in turn, exacerbate COVID-19 fatalities. These two features may be particularly lethal when combined. To test this hypothesis, we examined the growth rate of both confirmed COVID-19 cases and deaths in an early 30-day period of the outbreak in the counties located in each of the 100 largest metropolitan areas in the U.S. The growth curve for cases and deaths was steeper in counties located in metropolitan areas that residentially segregate Blacks and Hispanics. Moreover, this effect of racial residential segregation was augmented by income inequality within each county. The current evidence highlights the role of racial and economic disparity in producing the devastating human toll in the current pandemic. It also offers important policy implications for making virus-resilient cities.

scholarly journals Trends in U.S. Residential Racial Segregation, 1990 to 2020

2021 ◽  
Vol 7 ◽  
pp. 237802312110539
Author(s):  
Benjamin Elbers
Keyword(s):  
Data Visualization ◽  
Census Data ◽  
Metropolitan Areas ◽  
Racial Segregation ◽  
Entire Period ◽  
Racial Groups ◽  
White Population ◽  
Recent Period ◽  
Information Index

This data visualization presents changes in U.S. residential racial segregation from 1990 to 2020, including the recently released 2020 census data. Using Theil’s information index H, the visualization shows both the multigroup index of segregation that involves all racial groups and also all possible pairwise indices of the four major racial groups: whites, Blacks, Hispanics, and Asians. Although multigroup segregation declined by about 12 percent to 16 percent in every decade, the results for some racial groups are more mixed. The segregation of Blacks from all other groups declined over the entire period, but the segregation of Hispanics and Asians from the white population increased, as did the segregation between Hispanics and Asians. For the most recent period, 2010 to 2020, all pairwise segregation indices declined by between 7 percent and 14 percent, except Asian-white segregation, which increased by about 3 percent. Despite these declines, Blacks in particular remain highly segregated from whites and Asians in many U.S. metropolitan areas.

scholarly journals Imperfect melting pot – analysis of changes in diversity and segregation of US urban census tracts in the period of 1990-2010

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tomasz Stepinski ◽  
Anna Dmowska
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Scale ◽  
First Principles ◽  
Urban Areas ◽  
Temporal Change ◽  
Metropolitan Areas ◽  
Racial Segregation ◽  
Racial Diversity ◽  
Access Time ◽  
Census Block ◽  
Melting Pot

Analyzing racial distribution and its temporal change in American urban areas is an active area of research. Mostattention focused on assessing levels of racial segregation at the spatial scale of a metropolitan area. In this paper, we present an analysis of 1990-2010 changes to racial diversity and segregation on a much smaller spatial scale of an urban census tract. To access time-standardized racial information at the tract and at the census block scales we use multiyear compatible high-resolution population grids. Indices of racial diversity and segregation are calculated for over 30,000 tracts pooled from 41 metropolitan areas. Statistical analysis of this dataset reveals that during the 1990-2010 period urban tracts increased their diversity in line with diversity increases of entire metro areas, but unlike metros, they also increased their levels of segregation. We hypothesize that an increased tendency for the residences of people of the same race to spatially aggregate on the tract scale is the result of individuals exercising preferences regarding their neighbors in reaction to the nationwide increase in diversity of the American population. The study also re-derives diversity and segregation indices from the first principles of the information theory, highlights the need to think about the issue of racial diversity/segregation in terms of spatial patterns, and uses one-person-per-dot maps to connect diversity/segregation indices to actual racial patterns.

scholarly journals The Instability of Highly Racially Diverse Residential Neighborhoods in the United States

2018 ◽  
Vol 6 (3) ◽  
pp. 365-381 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Wright ◽  
Mark Ellis ◽  
Steven R. Holloway ◽  
Gemma Catney
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Predominantly White ◽  
Metropolitan Areas ◽  
Racial Diversity ◽  
Black Population ◽  
The United States ◽  
Racially Diverse ◽  
Absolute Level ◽  
The Stability ◽  
High Diversity

This research concerns the location and stability of highly racially diverse census tracts in the United States. Like some other scholars, the authors define such tracts conservatively, requiring the significant presence of at least three racialized groups. Of the approximately 65,000 tracts in the country, there were 197 highly diverse tracts in 1990 and 998 in 2010. Most were located in large metropolitan areas. Stably integrated highly diverse tracts were the exception rather than the rule. The vast majority of highly diverse tracts transitioned to that state from being predominantly White. Those that transitioned from being highly racially diverse were most likely to transition to being majority Latino. Although the absolute level of metropolitan racial diversity has no effect on the stability of high-diversity tracts, change in both metropolitan-scale racial diversity and population raise the probability of a tract’s transitioning to high diversity. Metropolitan-scale racial diversity did not affect the stability of highly diverse tracts, but it did alter the patterns of succession from them. The authors also found that highly diverse tracts were unstable and less likely to form in metropolitan areas with high percentages of Blacks. Increased metropolitan-level diversity mutes this Black population share effect by reducing the probability of high-diversity tract succession to a Black majority.

Ethnic and Racial Segregation in U.S. Metropolitan Areas, 1980-2000

2007 ◽  
Vol 42 (4) ◽  
pp. 479-504 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ron Johnston ◽  
Michael Poulsen ◽  
James Forrest
Keyword(s):  
Metropolitan Areas ◽  
Racial Segregation

Liturgy as Identity Work in Predominantly African American Parishes

2019 ◽  
pp. 132-152
Author(s):  
Tia Noelle Pratt
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Religious Experience ◽  
Participant Observation ◽  
Identity Work ◽  
Religious Expression ◽  
American Catholicism ◽  
Black Catholics ◽  
Sociological Literature ◽  
Race And Religion ◽  
The U.S

The experiences of African American Catholics are grossly underrepresented in the sociological literature on both race and religion. This is due, in part, to the perception that being both Black and Catholic is a disparate identity. This chapter asserts that while the approximately three million Black Catholics in the U.S. are indeed a minority, their historically rich past and dynamic present make them an integral part of both American Catholicism and the African American religious experience. This chapter explores how Black Catholics in predominantly African American parishes use liturgy to actively combine their dual heritages in forming a distinct Black Catholic identity. Participant observation research identified three distinct styles of liturgy—Traditionalist, Spirited, and Gospel—that highlight the diversity of religious expression among African American Catholics while also heeding the mandate of the Black Bishops of the U.S. to be “authentically Black” and “truly Catholic.”

Racial Identity Among Blacks and Whites in the U.S.

2021 ◽  
pp. 61-83
Author(s):  
K. Jill Kiecolt ◽  
W. Carson Byrd ◽  
Hans Momplaisir ◽  
Michael Hughes
Keyword(s):  
Racial Identity ◽  
Blacks And Whites ◽  
The U.S

Civil Defense—the New Debate

Worldview ◽  
1979 ◽  
Vol 22 (1-2) ◽  
pp. 46-48
Author(s):  
Paul Ramsey
Keyword(s):  
Crisis Management ◽  
Metropolitan Areas ◽  
Civil Defense ◽  
Nuclear War ◽  
The U.S

The trial balloons recently sent up about protecting our population in the event of nuclear war focus on the staged evacuation of cities— not, as in the early Sixties, on bomb shelters. The aim today is more on countering nuclear threats, less on protecting people or defending the nation. A capability to maneuver people (like troops) is needed to give the president an option to yielding to nuclear blackmail.This is what is called crisis management, and it has a “logic” of its own. For example, the U.S. would have to be able to move people out of cities, or protect them there, in vastly greater numbers than Russia needs to do simply to make things even. We have far more of our population in far more and far more populous metropolitan areas than has Russia. The president, if he is sensible, is more likely to yield to power-moves under cover of nuclear threats than is Russia. He must blink first. Under such conditions, who now has the more credible deterrent?

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