Linking Integration and Residential Segregation

Policy-makers tend to view ethnic segregation of minority ethnic group in a negative light as it is seen as an obstacle to their integration. Also in the academic literature a strong link between segregation and integration is suggested. In the literature on neighbourhood effects, the residential concentration of minorities is seen as a major impediment to their social mobility and acculturation, while the residential segregation literature emphasises the opposite causal direction, by focussing on the effect of integration on levels of (de-)segregation. This book, however, shows that integration and segregation cannot be linked in a straightforward way. Based on research in a wide variety of western countries, it can be concluded that the process of assimilation into the housing market is highly complex and differs between and within ethnic groups. The integration pathway not only depends on the characteristics of migrants themselves, but also on the reactions of the institutions and the population of the receiving society. This book was originally published as a special issue of Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies.