(Re)Viewing Ethnic Residential Segregation in Southern European Cities: Housing and Urban Regimes as Mechanisms of Marginalisation

Abstract

Housing and residential marginalisation in Southern European cities represents the most critical and controversial of urban conditions for the settlement and inclusion of immigrants. However, these issues are conspicuously under-researched in both the international and Southern European comparative literature. The complexity of ethnic housing hardship and segregation is often de-problematised and misleadingly attributed solely to market mechanisms or inevitable polarisation dynamics. This paper reviews the distinctive features of ethnic residential segregation within wider societal and urban contexts, drawing on an analysis of eight Mediterranean cities with a special focus on the role of housing systems and processes of ethnic and social differentiation. Problems and drivers are reconceptualised within an holistic, comparative framework. It is demonstrated that low levels of ethnic spatial segregation conceal a real problem of social residential marginalisation. This paradox predominantly originates from macro-scale mechanisms of differentiation rooted in the welfare redistributive arrangements and dualist housing systems. It is additionally reinforced by current urban renewal strategies.