Comparative Perspectives on Urban Segregation:
Chicago, Paris, and Rio de Janeiro
Chicago, June 3-4, 2005
A Word from the Conference Organizers:
Marco Oberti, Sciences po Paris- OSC Cities as different as Chicago , Paris , Rio , and Sao Paulo are experiencing similar processes of strong social differentiation within their regions. Chicago is often presented as one of the most segregated cities of the United States , and its black ghetto is seen as emblematic. In the same way, the favelas of Rio and Sao Paulo represent the extreme concentration of poverty in Brazilian cities. In Paris , the huge neighborhoods of social (public) housing, where immigrants and low-income populations are concentrated, are increasingly seen as spaces of segregation.
These three major cases of urban segregation and marginalization, while they do indeed represent strong tendencies in the transformation of these cities, should not lead to the mistaken conclusion that the process is always a simple polarization between poor neighborhoods and all the other types of neighborhoods.
The purpose of the conference is to use a comparative perspective to understand the intensity, the forms and the effects of social and ethnic differentiation within these different cities.
The choice of U.S. , Brazilian, and French cities is pertinent to understanding how different historical, institutional and political trajectories in these three countries have produced different meanings of and orientations toward the categories of social class, race, and ethnicity in intellectual analysis and research.
There is a sharp contrast between the United States , with its omnipresent references to race and ethnicity, and France , where these categories are denied or treated euphemistically. The orientation towards social class remains correspondingly strong in France , with the utilization of a standardized socio-occupational classification. Brazil appears to occupy an intermediate position. So we must also examine our research methodologies, our techniques, and our analyses of the nature of urban segregation.
Roberta Garner, DePaul University This conference addressed a topic of urgency in today's globalized world: urban segregation. It seems to many observers that classes and racial/ethnic groups are drawing apart in urban spaces. The extensive growth of slums, ghettoes, favelas, and "neighborhoods in difficulty" is one sign; at the other end of the socio-economic spectrum we see gated communities of the wealthy and increasingly of the middle classes as well, and special enclaves of corporate elites. The street and the public school-the two great public spaces of modern society, the areas of common ground-are shrinking, shunned, or being privatized. Even the media are producing multiple versions for differentiated communities. Our conference examined these processes. Are they really taking place-is segregation actually increasing? What is the relationship between class and racial/ethnic segregation, and is that relationship different in different nations? How do we measure segregation and can these measures be applied cross-nationally? What are the qualitative aspects of the drawing apart of social groups-what discourses and perceptions sustain, accelerate or slow it down? What are the visual aspects of segregation-what do segregated landscapes look like? Are the processes of differentiation and exclusion similar in Paris , Rio , and Chicago (and Capetown) within their national and historical contexts?
Comparative Perspectives on Urban Segregation:
Chicago, Paris, and Rio de Janeiro
Cortelyou Commons
2324 N. Fremont Chicago, IL60614
Sponsored by:
DePaul University
Department of Sociology
Department of Modern Languages
African and Black Diaspora Studies
Northwestern University Institute for Policy Research
Center for International and Comparative Studies
Sciences po Paris
Observatoire Sociologique du Changement
In friendly cooperation with the French Consulate in Chicago
Organization:
Roberta Garner
( DePaul University , rgarner@depaul.edu)
Marco Oberti
(Sciences po Paris- OSC, marco.oberti@sciences-po.fr )
Presentation
Cities as different as Chicago, Paris, Rio, and Sao Paulo are experiencing similar processes of strong social differentiation within their regions. Chicago is often presented as one of the most segregated cities of the United States, and its black ghetto is seen as emblematic. In the same way, the favelas of Rio and Sao Paulo represent the extreme concentration of poverty in Brazilian cities. In Paris, the huge neighborhoods of public housing, where immigrants and low-income populations are concentrated, are increasingly seen as spaces of segregation. These three major cases of urban segregation and marginalization, while they do indeed represent strong tendencies in the transformation of these cities, should not lead to the mistaken conclusion that the process is always a simple polarization between poor neighborhoods and all the other types of neighborhoods. The purpose of the conference is to use a comparative perspective to understand the intensity, the forms and the effects of social and ethnic differentiation within these different cities. The choice of U.S., Brazilian, and French cities is pertinent to understanding how different historical, institutional and political trajectories in these three countries have produced different meanings of and orientations toward the categories of social class, race, and ethnicity in intellectual analysis and research. There is a sharp contrast between the United States, with its omnipresent references to race and ethnicity, and France, where these categories are denied or treated euphemistically. The orientation towards social class remains correspondingly strong in France, with the utilization of a standardized socio-occupational classification. Brazil appears to occupy an intermediate position. So we must also examine our research methodologies, our techniques, and our analyses of the nature of urban segregation.
Friday- 3 June
Session 1: Noon to 1:45 PM
Measures and Tendencies Toward Social and Ethnic Segregation: Overview and Methodological Issues
Moderator: Roberta Garner ( DePaul University )
Rio de Janeiro Alberto Lopez Najar (ENSP/FIOCRUZ, Rio)
Please email Marco Oberti to make a reservation for breakfast and/or lunch on Saturday June 4
Marco Oberti (marco.oberti@sciences-po.fr)
Abstract for Session 1: Racial Geography and Racial Movement in Metropolitan Chicago: Rethinking Models, Methods and Mobility Kiljoong Kim and Black Hawk Hancock (DePaul University)
This paper aims to understand the role of race and ethnicity in the formation of suburban and urban residential contexts and their continuing effect on the composition of the urban and suburban landscapes. In order to determine both objective and subjective understandings of how the racial environment is constructed and organized, we suggest employing a multi-method analysis in which we use both census data to map a longitudinal pattern of social mobility and stasis in GIS software, as well as ethnographic observation and extended interviews with residents of various neighborhoods. Our intent is to reconcile the "abstract space," which is constructed through Census data and typically used to display general demographic and economic information for rational planning and public policy, with the "inhabited space" that is constructed through everyday living, understanding, and meaningful connectedness to a particular neighborhood. We believe this method will enable us to reveal new levels of actual and perceived integration and segregation among and between all ethnic groups, as well as new trends in ethnic and racial mobility that are currently shaping the urban landscape. In addition, this model will enable us to understand the impact of suburbanization, gentrification, and the increasing displacement of the urban underclass as macro level phenomena. This multi-method analysis offers a superior scientific analysis of the intersection of race and space by advancing beyond the traditional Black/White binary of traditional social analysis, single causal processes (gentrification as displacement of urban poor), the effect of one racial group without reference to others (i.e. White racism or White flight), and therefore enables us to better understand how spatial distinctions and racial characteristics shape residential patterns and social organization in order to concretely address issues of integration, assimilation, and racial pluralism of metropolitan spaces.
Abstract for Session 1: The Multicultural Metropolis: Neighborhood Diversity and Segregation Patterns in the City of Chicago, 1990-2000 Juan Onesimo Sandoval (Northwestern University)
This paper examines neighborhood diversity and segregation in Chicago from 1990-2000. I explore three questions in this paper: (1) how did the growing Latino and Asian populations impact neighborhood diversity?; (2) how much of the segregation is due to white and nonwhite settlement patterns?; and (3) what explains the neighborhood diversity? The data we used for this study came from the 1990 and 2000 Census. I decomposed the segregation score between white and nonwhite racial groups and between black, Latinos, and Asians. Finally, I study the impact of Latino and Asian immigration settlement patterns and explore how these new settlement patterns are changing the nature of residential segregation in Chicago .
Abstract for Session 2: The Favelas of Rio Alberto Najar (ENSP/FIOCRUZ, Rio)
Gustavo Rivera (University of Chicago)
Approached as an always already constituted biopolitical space existing in advance of the social circumstances that produced them, the favela has been naturalized as a problem—as either a problem in and of itself or as a place where problems occur. By positing the favela as a problem, we have foreclosed the possibility of asking questions about the processes involved in bringing the favelas to discursive life. In this paper, I engage the favela with history, a field often overlooked in the analysis of Brazilian squatter settlements, and explore the ways in which the Brazilian nation-state project contributed to the emergence of favelas in early 20 th century Rio de Janeiro. Through a critical examination of the Brazilian nation-state project and the ways in which it was materialized on and through the urban landscape, I trace the displacement of the poor and working class from the city center, and argue that these processes, coupled with the lack of affordable housing in surrounding neighborhoods, led to the emergence of favelas.
Abstract for Session 2: Neighborhoods “In Trouble” in France Hugues Lagrange (Observatoire Sociologique du Changement, CNRS-FNSP, Paris)
Socialisation processes and segregation : success and failures in eight cities scattered along the river Seine, (fifty to sixty kilometers from Paris , France ) whose population has been constituted by the families of industrial plant workers.
Based on an analysis of a cohort of children from the seventh grade to the tenth grade, along with socio-demographic data, the study shows a high level of ethno-cultural segregation, at least for the French standards. This segregation processes increased strongly during the eighties, and the poorest census tracts experienced relatively high levels of socialisation failures (mostly school underachievement and delinquency). But recently, a reverse of this tendency has been observed : an improvement in elementary school achievement and a slight decrease in delinquency. This improvements are related to the stabilisation of the population, to an increase in the proportion of women in the labour market and to a strong effort of public bodies and grass-root associations to support and train children.
Comparative research using the same framework in a district of Paris and a suburb of Nantes will give comparative elements.
Abstract for Session 3: Chicago's Black Middle Class Mary Pattillo (Northwestern University)
This presentation has two goals, first to illuminate the effects of racial and class segregation on the settlement patterns of Chicago 's black middle class, and second to raise new issues as middle class blacks move into very poor black communities in Chicago as gentrifiers. For the first part, I offer two conclusions: 1) contrary to the position of William Julius Wilson, black middle class out-migration is not a new phenomenon, but rather has characterized black urban communities at least since the early twentieth century, 2) post-WWII growth in the number of middle class African Americans has its spatial corollary in the form of larger black middle class enclaves, which increases the distance between the black middle class and the black poor. For the second part, I turn to the black gentrification of Chicago 's mid-South side. In particular, I propose a theory of "black middlemen" and "middlewomen". Members of this category (which surely has its antecedents, but is distinguished by its contemporary size and prominence) have established themselves within networks of public and private power in Chicago and beyond, but rarely seem to be "where the buck stops." Serving in a range of capacities from head of City agencies, to influential private developers, to spokespeople to black audiences, black middlemen/women exist within a system of coalition politics that fosters and requires both finesse and subterfuge in the back and forth translation of the demands of various interest groups. To conclude, there are two geographies of black middle class Chicago, one characterized by the far south side collection of communities of lower middle class African Americans. These areas are being destabilized by the transformation of public housing and the gentrification of the core Black Belt areas. A second area is characterized by the in-migration of professional and upper middle class African Americans to very poor black neighborhoods. It is unclear if these areas will maintain a black majority.
Abstract for Session 4: Social And Educational Differentiation In Paris Suburbs Marco Oberti (Sciences Po/OSC, Paris)
Distribution of school provision in the greater Paris metropolitan area, including availability of certain courses and study programs, is strongly correlated with the social profiles of the different localities and corresponds to sharp disparities. The highly diversified, attractive school options in localities whose residents are highly privileged in socio-economic and occupational terms stands in contrast to the less diversified educational resources, including fewer course and study program options, and reduced private school presence in more markedly working-class municipalities. Different approaches to school choice are strongly linked to parents' socio-economic status but do not amount merely to practices for avoiding stigmatized middle schools in working-class localities. Those approaches make sense when considered in relation to what may be tightly circumscribed social and school environments and differentiated social positions and demands. The results presented here call into question the effectiveness of school districting rules in France aimed at regulating the social profile of middle schools.
As in London, Amsterdam , and Madrid , school dynamics and urban space in the outskirts of Paris are closely intertwined and increasingly interact in producing segregation.
