White Response to Neighborhood Racial Change

Abstract

In this study of ten cities, data for tracts that underwent racial transition were employed. Normal household turnover rates were predicted on the basis of nonracial housing and demographic characteristics. It was found that the white population of these tracts exhibited abnormally high household turnovers, indicating “white flight” from changing areas. The in-migration of whites was found to fall short of both the level necessary to replace those whites who actually moved out, and the level needed to replace whites who would have moved under conditions of racial stability.     

Indexes of Racial Residential Segregation for 109 Cities in the United States, 1940 to 1970

Abstract

An index of racial residential segregation for a city may be calculated from census data reporting the number of white and nonwhite households resident in each city block. Such an index summarizes the dissimilarity in residential location of the two groups. Segregation indexes for 109 cities for the years 1940, 1950, and 1960 were published in Taeuber and Taeuber Negroes in Cities (1965).

Segregation indexes for 109 cities for 1970, together with the previously published indexes for the three earlier census dates, are presented in Table 1. The trend data from 1940 through 1970 refer to residential segregation of whites and nonwhites. For 1970 only, segregation indexes are also presented comparing whites and Negroes.

The trend data reveal a distinctive pattern of change during each of the three decades. From 1960 to 1970, declines in segregation prevailed among cities in each region of the country.

The indexes for 1970 were calculated from Public Use Summary Tapes issued by the Bureau of the Census. Certain difficulties were encountered in the use of these tapes. A methodological appendix describes the data source and retrieval procedure for calculation of city segregation indexes for 1970.     

Foster care,geographic neighborhood change,and the risk of delinquency

Background and purposePrevious studies report that foster care placement is associated with an increased risk of delinquency. Yet it remains unclear which aspects of the placement experience increase the risk of delinquency. The current study addresses this knowledge gap. This study investigates the relationship between geographic neighborhood change and the risk of delinquency for adolescents in foster care settings. Based on findings from the neighborhood effects literatures, we hypothesize that moving to a neighborhood characterized by concentrated disadvantage and residential instability is associated with increased risk of delinquency.MethodsThe design for the current study is longitudinal. The sample is comprised of 145 foster youth from two birth cohorts, one born in 1983 and one in 1984, in Chicago, Illinois. The sample was 92% African American and 52% male. Overall, 11% had an official juvenile arrest. We used data from multiple sources, including the 1990 census data and administrative data from the Illinois Department of Children and Family Services and the Cook County Juvenile Court. To measure neighborhood change, we calculated a difference between children's home and placement neighborhoods on ten census variables: percentages of households in a given neighborhood that were below the poverty line, neighborhood households on public assistance, female-headed households, unemployed population, and persons < 18 years old, African American, Latino, foreign-born, residents living in the same house as five years earlier, and owner-occupied homes, all of which are commonly used in neighborhood studies. We identified two factors within the neighborhood variables—concentrated disadvantage and residential instability,—and used the two-factor scores in the following analysis. We conducted a Cox regression to model time to first arrest.ResultsThe results indicate that moving to a neighborhood with high residential instability significantly increases an individual's risk of juvenile delinquency. In addition, two subgroups—male foster youth; and all foster youth with an experience of neglect—are significantly more likely to be associated with a formal delinquency petition.Conclusions and implicationsThe current study is unique and builds the knowledge base with regard to the placement of children and adolescents in substitute care settings. The findings indicate that the neighborhoods in which children are placed do matter in terms of their outcomes, and thus they should be considered in the placement decision process. This finding is consistent with the “person-in-environment” concept advanced by social work professionals.     

Globalization,Plague and the Local Community: Healthcare Capacity,Politics, and the Microbe War

Abstract

Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) is the first major international epidemic of the twenty-first century. In a few short months it spread to every continent, infected 8,096 people, and claimed the lives of 774. It hit older persons particularly hard; it killed 50 percent of the infected of that age category.

The rate of plague's spread from one country to another has greatly increased as the globalization of the world's economy has produced rapid daily transportation of people, products, plants, animals, and, of course, microbes. Each day cities are at risk for the invasion of deadly infectious diseases. While international expert agencies such as the World Health Organization stand by to help fight outbreaks, ultimately, plagues are fought in the local community.

I discuss two theses: (1) To successfully contain and fight a major epidemic the capacity of the community's health care system must be enhanced by its functional linkages to external expert and bridging organizations and systems of organizations; and (2) that the extent to which a community's health care system can draw on external expert and bridging organizations and systems is a function of the degree to which the political state in which the community is embedded facilitates for fails to facilitate) those linkages.

My focus is on Hong Kong and the cities of the People's Republic of China; they were at the epicenter of the SARS outbreak, and it was from them that the contagion spread to other countries. Findings show that plagues are not only matters of biology and health, but also matters of politics, power, and international relations.     

ENVIRONMENTAL INEQUALITY IN METROPOLITAN AMERICA IN 2000

ABSTRACT

This article compares black and Hispanic environmental inequality levels across 14 of the largest metropolitan areas in the United States and asks how conclusions regarding the existence of environmental inequality differ when different definitions of environmental inequality are employed. Using census tracts as the unit of analysis, industrial pollution data from the Toxic Release Inventory, and demographic data from the U.S. census, tobit regression analysis is used to determine whether two types of environmental racial inequality—disparate social impacts inequality and relative distribution inequality—existed in each metropolitan area in 2000. Results show that black and Hispanic environmental inequality were fairly widespread throughout the 14 metropolitan areas, that Hispanic environmental inequality was more widespread than black environmental inequality, and that conclusions vary depending upon which definition of environmental inequality is employed. This latter findings suggests that the conclusions researchers draw are likely to be inaccurate if they do not properly specify the definitions of environmental inequality they are using and the types of environmental inequality they are studying.     

Desire,Cultural Dissonance,and Incentives for Remaining HIV-Negative

SUMMARY

This article, written from the personal observations of an HIVprevention coordinator in San Francisco, discusses some of the current challenges for gay and bisexual men'S primary HIVprevention efforts. Psychological issues of personal motivation and identity formation are lopked at within the framework of gay culture, pop culture, and the larger heterosexual culture emphasizing their influence on the lives of HIVnegative men. The article also looks at age-specific dimensions comparing the needs of adult men with those of much younger gay and bisexual men. Renewed energy and fresh ideas will be called for to make HIVprevention interventions relevant to the lives of these men. Though the examples and qualitative data cited are from San Francisco, similar phenomena are noted from other cities with gay networks within the U.S. and internationally, suggesting that the: experience of San Francisco men will be relevant to prevention providers in any other locales.     

Ecosystem services in managing residential landscapes: priorities,value dimensions,and cross-regional patterns

Although ecosystem services have been intensively examined in certain domains (e.g., forests and wetlands), little research has assessed ecosystem services for the most dominant landscape type in urban ecosystems—namely, residential yards. In this paper, we report findings of a cross-site survey of homeowners in six U.S. cities to 1) examine how residents subjectively value various ecosystem services, 2) explore distinctive dimensions of those values, and 3) test the urban homogenization hypothesis. This hypothesis posits that urbanization leads to similarities in the social-ecological dynamics across cities in diverse biomes. By extension, the thesis suggests that residents’ ecosystem service priorities for residential landscapes will be similar regardless of whether residents live in the humid East or the arid West, or the warm South or the cold North. Results underscored that cultural services were of utmost importance, particularly anthropocentric values including aesthetics, low-maintenance, and personal enjoyment. Using factor analyses, distinctive dimensions of residents’ values were found to partially align with the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment’s categories (provisioning, regulating, supporting, and cultural). Finally, residents’ ecosystem service priorities exhibited significant homogenization across regions. In particular, the traditional lawn aesthetic (neat, green, weed-free yards) was similarly important across residents of diverse U.S. cities. Only a few exceptions were found across different environmental and social contexts; for example, cooling effects were more important in the warm South, where residents also valued aesthetics more than those in the North, where low-maintenance yards were a greater priority.     

Segmented Assimilation,Local Context and Determinants of Drug Violence in Miami and San Diego: Does Ethnicity and Immigration Matter?1

Does the ethnic and immigrant composition of a community and existence of immigrant enclaves or barrios influence community level drug violence? This study explores the relationship between these and other factors in Miami and San Diego census tracts. We employ data about the distribution of Cubans, Central Americans, Haitians, Mexicans and Southeast Asians, controlling for social and economic influences of drug versus non‐drug violence. We also analyze the impact of various waves of immigration and immigrant communities to understand the circumstances under which drug violence occurs or is limited at the census tract level. The findings lend some support to the positive and negative aspects of Portes and Rumbaut's (2001) segmented assimilation hypothesis in Miami and San Diego neighborhoods. The strength of this conclusion varies and is contingent upon ethnic composition, new versus old immigration, and the all‐encompassing effects of economic deprivation     

The Impact of the Social Environment on Nursing Home Residents

ABSTRACT

This study contrasted the experienced quality of life of residents living on one of two nursing home units: a unit for those considered socially intact and a unit combining residents who had moderately impaired cognition or physical function with those requiring skilled nursing or therapy. Qualitative interviews were held with residents of both units. The findings indicate that the social environment of each of the units played a fundamental role in the residents' quality of life. The social environment affected the residents' conceptions of self, their interactions with other residents and their interactions with the nursing staff. The article suggests the processes behind the social environment of each floor that may have resulted in different perceptions of the quality of life.     

Community Perceptions of Industrial Risks Before and After a Toxic Flood: The Case of Houston and Hurricane Harvey

Abstract

The present study examines risk perceptions before and after a recent natural-technological event. The aim is to improve understanding of how long-time residents understand chronic and acute industrial risks, including hazardous industrial releases triggered by natural disasters. Thirty-two interviews were conducted in Channelview, Texas: 19 in February 2017, six months before Hurricane Harvey’s landfall, and 13 with those same residents in December 2017, four months after Harvey’s landfall. Results indicate that long-time residents normalized chronic risks of industrial pollution before the storm, but they were either unaware or incredulous that major industrial spills might result from a hurricane. After such an event, residents strengthened their normalization of industrial risks and became even more inclined to frame them as coming from external forces rather than from local facilities that continue to put their community at risk.     

A Landscape of Respect Relations: Television,Status, Houses

ABSTRACT

In this article, I focus on residents in predominantly East Indian villages in Guyana to bring out their contextual identities in relation to places, houses, and television. In the status transactions that occur, landscapes of respect relations are formed: place is made “open” for residents to appear in partial contexts which confirm or challenge their respect notions. The houses mark the boundary between inside and outside where those who are visible on dams and roads lose respect. The data illustrates how these boundaries are observed and/or changed vis-à-vis physical arrangements, liming (forms of hanging out), and television. The interactions demonstrate respect notions in practice as status entanglements in relation to the visibility of persons in different settings.     

Sex and the census: why surveys should not conflate sex and gender identity

ABSTRACT

The UK census authorities have proposed guidance for the 2021 census indicating that the sex question may be answered according to subjective gender identity. This raises issues about the measurement of sex and gender identity which other data collection exercises are also contending with. This paper addresses the questions that have arisen regarding the census, before going on to explain how these questions have emerged more widely. Finally, I address the difficulties of discussing the collection of data on sex in a climate of policy capture and silencing.     

Meeting Them Where They Are: An Exploratory Study of Staff and Shelter Resident Perceptions of Homeless Women's Needs

Abstract

Only a small number of studies have surveyed homeless people about their needs, and none has compared these perceptions with those of homeless service providers. In this small, preliminary, exploratory investigation, both shelter residents and staff at one homeless shelter dedicated to serving dually-diagnosed adult women were queried about shelter resident need. Residents and staff agreed on the need for immediate, non-change-oriented services (such as assistance with overdue bills and housing) and some shorter-term services (such as education and job skills training). The two groups disagreed on the need for longer-term, change-oriented services, such as substance abuse treatment, education about activities of daily living, and health/counseling services (with more staff than residents perceiving such need). Two potential recommendations are discussed. Staff could consider altering the timing of treatment plan creation to increase engagement with homeless clients. Shelter directors and funders could consider modifying the measurement of client outcomes to include client progression toward longer-term change.     

CHANGING PATTERNS OF SPATIAL DIFFERENTIATION IN URBAN CANADA, 1961–1971*

Les configurations de la différenciation spatiale en 1971 sont examinées à partir des données par secteurs de recensement et on trouve qu'elles sont assez proches de celles de 1961. Le niveau socioéconomique a varié principalement par secteur, la situation familiale a varié par zone, et le statut ethnique n'a varié ni par l'un ni par l'autre d'une manière marquante. Bien que les changements décennaux soient petits, nos résultats sont en opposition avec l'hypothèse évolutionniste de Schnore en ce qui concerne la différenciation socioéconomique. Dans la majorité des villes canadiennes, le statut des secteurs de recensement du centre ville s'est effectivement élevé et le statut des secteurs des faubourgs a baissé. La situation familiale devient plus différenciée par zone, ce qui soutient l'hypothèse évolutionniste. Le statut ethnique décrit seulement de faibles configurations par zone et par secteur pour les deux années étudiées.
Using census tract data, patterns of spatial differentiation in 1971 are examined and found to be fairly close to those that existed in 1961. Spatial patterning of socioeconomic status was dominantly sectoral, family status was zonal, and ethnic status not markedly one orthe other. Though the changes during the decade are small, our findings run contrary to the evolutionary hypothesis of Schnore with regard to socioeconomic differentiation. The majority of Canadian cities actually increased in the status of inner-city census tracts and decreased in the status of outlying, suburban tracts. Family status is becoming more zonally differentiated, which is supportive of the evolutionary hypothesis. Ethnic status describes only rather weak zonal and sectoral patterns in either year.     

The relationship between socioeconomic status and infant mortality in a metropolitan aggregate, 1989–1991

This paper presents the results of an ecological analysis of the relationship between infant mortality and economic status in a metropolitan aggregate comprised of seven of the larger cities in Ohio during the three years centering on the 1990 census. Using a summary income score derived for the census tract of mother's usual residence, the census tracts in the seven metropolitan centers were divided into broad income groupings and three-year average infant mortality rates were computed for each area, by age, sex, race, and selected causes of death. The most important conclusion to be drawn from the data is that in spite of some remarkable declines in overall levels of infant mortality during the past few decades, there continues to be a very clear and pronounced inverse association between income status and infant mortality. The general inverse association is observed for both sexes, for whites and nonwhites, and for all major causes of infant death. At the same time, the data reveal notable differences in the magnitude of the relationship by sex, and especially by age at death, race, and cause of death. Explanations of these differences are suggested, and a conclusion notes some of the difficulties encountered in developing programs aimed at closing the infant mortality gap between the richest and poorest segments of the society.This is an expanded version of a paper presented at the annual meetings of the Eastern Sociological Society in Baltimore, Maryland (March 17–20, 1994).     

Family,Denomination, and the Adolescent World View: An Empirical Enquiry Among 13- to 15-Year-Old Girls in England and Wales

ABSTRACT

The present study draws on a large survey of 16,581 13- to 15-year-old girls representative of the school population in England and Wales to examine the power of family denominational affiliation to predict the adolescent world view. World view was illustrated by reference to nine areas: personal well-being, worries, counseling, school, social concern, religious beliefs, paranormal beliefs, sexual morality, and attitudes toward substances. Comparisons were made between those who claimed no religious affiliation and those who claimed affiliation as Anglicans, Roman Catholics, Methodists, Baptists, Presbyterians, Pentecostals, and Jehovah's Witnesses. The data demonstrated that each of these seven denominational groups offered a distinctive profile in areas of personal and social importance. These findings were interpreted as offering support for views advanced in Canada by Bibby, in Australia by Bouma, and in the United Kingdom by Fane regarding the continuing social significance of religious and denominational affiliation and as offering critique of the British Government's decision not to include denominational subdivision of the Christian category within the 2001 census conducted in England and Wales.     

Environment,Security, and Terrorism in the Trinational Frontier of the Southern Cone

This article analyzes the transformations of notions of governmentality, security, and sovereignty behind recent processes of securitization in the trinational frontier of the Southern Cone, which encompasses the cities of Puerto Iguaz? (Argentina), Ciudad del Este (Paraguay), and Foz do Igua?? (Brazil). It examines how early concerns with security that were primarily focused on the territorial integrity of nation-states have been replaced with security concerns of a more global nature, which call into question established mechanisms of control, particularly those related to the defense of national borders. It examines how environmental concerns are increasingly becoming conflated with other current forms of securitization such as terrorism, popular unrest, and narcotraffic and it analyzes devastating effects of these processes on peoples of the South, particularly the poor.     

Datafication,development and marginalised urban communities: an applied data justice framework

ABSTRACT

The role of data within international development is rapidly expanding. However, the recency of this phenomenon means analysis has been lagging; particularly, analysis of broader impacts of real-world initiatives. Addressing this gap through a focus on data’s increasing presence in urban development, this paper makes two contributions. First – drawing from the emerging literature on ‘data justice’ – it presents an explicit, systematic and comprehensive new framework that can be used for analysis of datafication. Second, it applies the framework to four mapping initiatives in cities of the global South. These initiatives capture and visualise new data about marginalised communities: residents living in slums and other informal settlements about whom data has traditionally been lacking. Analysing across procedural, rights, instrumental and structural dimensions, it finds these initiatives deliver real incremental gains for their target communities. But it is external actors and wealthier communities that gain more; thus, increasing relative inequality.