Neighborhood Racial Change and Regional Differences in Segregation Trends

John R. Logan, Brown University
Wenquan C. Zhang, Texas A&M University

There has been much speculation about black-white segregation trends in the emerging multiethnic metropolis. This study compares multiethnic metropolises of the Northeast and Midwest (New York-New Jersey and Chicago) and the Southwest and West (California and Texas). It demonstrates that in both cases recent declines in black-white segregation are mainly associated with the development of neighborhoods where not only whites and blacks, but also Hispanics and Asians, reside. The more rapid decline of segregation in the Southwest and West during 1980-2000 is shown to be associated with the larger number of tracts that already had white, Hispanic and Asian settlement in 1980, and where blacks entered during the period. The greater persistence of segregation in the Northeast and Midwest is shown to be linked to a smaller pool of ethnically mixed neighborhoods in 1980 and a higher rate of white exodus from previously mixed zones.