Together and Apart: the Dynamics of Ethnic Diversity, Segregation and Social Cohesion among Young People and Adults

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Rising ethnic diversity across countries is becoming a highly-charged issue. This is leading to intense academic, policy, and public debate, amid concerns that diversity may pose a threat to social cohesion. Within these debates, residential communities are increasingly seen as key sites across which both fractures may emerge, but also where opportunities for building cohesion exist. In light of this, research showing diverse communities weaken cohesion is worrying. Yet, there is a potentially key omission from this work: the role of residential segregation. While studies largely focus on the size of ethnic groups in an area they rarely explore whether the level of segregation in the area matters; that is, how (un)evenly ethnic groups are spread across it. This project aims to advance our understanding of the role segregation plays for cohesion alongside diversity; in particular, exploring what occurs at the intersection of the two: is it only in 'diverse and segregated' areas (where groups tend to live in separate neighbourhoods) in which cohesion is threatened? Can 'diverse and integrated' areas actually build more cohesion? We posit that how segregated a community is may form a 'missing link', helping to explain when diversity may build or undermine cohesion.This project draws on an interdisciplinary framework (geography, demography, and developmental fields); marshals longitudinal panel/cohort data linked to multiple censuses; applies advanced statistical methods; and measures multiple inter-ethnic, intra-community and wider cohesion outcomes and mechanisms. Through this it will conduct the most complete investigation to date into how both diversity and segregation across communities affects cohesion, among majority and minority young people and adults, contemporaneously and across their lives. This will include:*Performing some of the first robust 'causal' tests of how changes in community diversity and segregation affect cohesion over time, including asking: what happens to residents' cohesion when the levels of diversity and segregation in their communities change around them? Does moving into/out of communities with different levels of diversity and segregation affect peoples' cohesion?*Producing crucial insights into processes of residential selection in the diversity-segregation-cohesion relationship, including: do levels of diversity and segregation affect beliefs and decisions to move into/out of certain communities? How far are such decisions driven by inter-ethnic attitudes? Or, are they driven instead by processes such as life cycle or disadvantage?*Exploring the role of communities in young people's cohesion, asking: does community diversity and segregation affect youth cohesion? What role do familial attitudes, schools environments, and civic activities, play in youth cohesion, and can these domains help understand the pathways through which communities impact young people? And, do the levels of diversity and segregation in the communities we grow up in exert enduring impacts on cohesion over people's lives?*Investigating how diversity and segregation across communities affect both minority and majority groups. For example: do minority-group residents respond in the same way as majority-group residents when they are more or less segregated from one another? How does the size of, and level of segregation from, other ethnic minority groups affect minority residents' cohesion? In particular, what occurs when newly-arrived immigrant-groups increasingly live among more established minority groups?Through partnering with the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government and building an advisory panel of experts and key youth and community stakeholders, this project will contribute to academic debates while engaging in high-impact knowledge exchange, generating a crucial evidence-base for practical policy solutions to directly feed into the government's developing integration strategy.