Norms in the politics of housing for minorities: Evidence from a French,a German and a US metropolitan area

Throughout Western societies, policy‐makers who address the problems of disadvantaged ethnic and immigrant minorities confront norms that prescribe equal or preferential treatment for these groups. Variations in these norms make significant differences in policy‐making. Based on evidence from housing and planning policies and a standardized survey of local élites in comparable German, French and US metropolitan areas, this article analyses how these norms altered logics of policy‐making. Normative differences help to explain why policies to house minorities proved more successful in the German setting than in the French. Contrasts in central‐local relations, in local government, in political parties and in the social and economic background of policy‐making fail to account for the difference that these norms make. In the American setting normative ambiguities combined with institutional, social and spatial differences to render parallel norms comparatively ineffective.     

Intersectionality,the household economy,and ethnic entrepreneurship†

ABSTRACT

The literature on ethnic entrepreneurship emphasizes the role of ethnicity in facilitating group differences in enterprise based on access to ethnic-based resources. This treatment tends to conflate family-based resources with those of ethnicity. Using a framework derived from intersectionality theory, this qualitative study investigates how two aspects of the household economy, namely household composition and family ideology, shape intra-group differences among fifty middle-class Mexican-origin entrepreneurs. Findings reveal that household class and gender dynamics shape access to three family-based resources that facilitate enterprise: family labour, entrepreneurial capital, and inheritance; differences in entrepreneurial activity between family members exceed in some cases those observed between ethnic groups. This study reveals that intersectional dimensions of identity and collectivity influence entrepreneurial outcomes within ethnic households. This study encourages researchers to consider how multiple and intersecting dimensions of identity combine for a more complete understanding of American enterprise.     

Does family language matter? The role of foreign language use and family social capital in the educational achievement of immigrant students in Germany

The role of ethnic resources in the educational success of immigrants is highly disputed. Combining arguments of segmented assimilation and Coleman's concept of family social capital, this study investigates whether speaking one's language of origin at home relates to achievement by facilitating the mobilization of resources or their transmission from parents to children. Mediating and moderating mechanisms are disentangled and empirically questioned in regression models that predict the mathematical competences of immigrant students from Turkey, Poland and the former Soviet Union. Based on data from the German National Educational Panel Study, the results contradict the assumption that foreign language use will contribute to education through mechanisms of social capital. Regardless of parental human capital or the group of origin, the language used at home does not affect the students’ learning when German language proficiency is accounted for.     

Recent increase of the exogamy rate in the Greek ethno-minority of Italy

In a study of the Greek ethno-linguistic community of Italy (nine villages in Apulia and four in Calabria) marriage data was obtained through direct interviews of 1653 families of primary school students (6–13 years old). The information collected consisted of the birth place of parents and grandparents of each informant. The data demonstrated that in the last generation an increase of intermarriage with native Italian speaking individuals occurred both in Apulia and Calabria (Apulia: grandparents 15.7%vs parents 33.5%; Calabria: grandparents 15.2%vs parents 31.9%).     

Which groups are mostly responsible for problems in your neighbourhood?

Abstract

Why and under which conditions do people employ ethnic categories rather than others (such as age, class, gender, and so on) to conceptually organize their social environment? This article analyses an open-ended question on who is seen as responsible for neighbourhood problems taken from a recently conducted large-scale survey in Germany. By doing so, this study tries to give novel insight on native Germans' use of ethnic folk classifications and aims to identify contextual factors that might explain why people characterize problem-groups in ethnic terms. This article shows that drunkards, the elderly and especially teenagers are seen as problem-groups more frequently than any ethnic minority. Conditions of economic decline and out-group size are analysed as to whether they are associated with a higher likelihood of using ethnic categories. The findings suggest that the effects of out-group size are diminishing in their impact, whereas the effects of economic decline are accumulating in strength.     

应用线粒体DNA D—loop区遗传多样性分析云南4个少数民族的遗传关系

对傣,佤,拉祜和藏族4个群体的99名个体mtDNA非编码区(D-loop)高变区I 16048－16569及I－41的563bp片优进行序列分析,计算了核酸多态度,并用Neighbro-Joining法构建系统进化树,在进化树中,99个mtDNA序列分别聚在4个群中,所有在COII／tRAN^Lys基因间序列存在9bp 缺失的个体均聚在C1如中,C2群由1个佤族个体和4个藏族个体组成,C3群中除2个藏族个体外均为其他3个民族个体,4个群体的大部分个体聚在C4群,根据核酸多态度计算的净遗传距离重建的进化树显示,傣族,佤族和拉祜族的亲缘关系较接近,与藏族距离较远,结果表明遗传距离与他们的地理分布是非常一致的,而拉枯族与相传同为氐羌后裔并有相近语言的藏族遗传距离却较远,这一结果提示这两个民族可能具有不同的起源。     

Fortress Holland? Support for ethnocentric policies among the 1994‐electorate of The Netherlands

Abstract

The Dutch have a long tradition of hospitality towards ethnic immigrants. In the nineties, however, quite dramatic changes have taken place among the Dutch. The central question addressed in this contribution is: to what extent do specific categories within the electorate favour ethnocentric policies? This question is answered by deducing hypotheses that are tested using recent data polled within the framework of the Dutch National Election Studies. Our crucial conclusion is that a rather widespread support for ethnocentric policies is present in contemporary Dutch society, especially among manual labourers, self‐employed and lowly educated people, but also among young cohorts and among modal income categories.     

Prejudice and tolerance in a period of increasing ethnic diversity and growing unemployment: Denmark since 1970

Abstract

Since the end of the 1960s Denmark, once an ethnically homogeneous country, has become more heterogeneous as a result of immigration by foreign workers and refugees. The question is how has this development influenced the attitudes in Denmark towards immigrants? The saliency of the immigrant issue has certainly grown, but contrary to expectations, the level of ethnocentrism has changed very little. If anything, the Danish population has become less prejudiced and more tolerant during the last thirty years. This conclusion, based on a number of national surveys, is even more conspicuous as the level of unemployment has increased in the same period.