Ethnic residential segregation in the city of Milan at the interplay between social class, housing and labour market

Abstract

This article analyses the spatial distribution of foreigners living in the city of Milan, based on data from the civil registry and relying on theories and methods from the residential segregation literature, exploring the dimensions of evenness, exposure, concentration, centralisation and clustering, as well as analysing migrants’ over/under-representation in specific areas through maps of their location quotients. Despite the low degree of ethnic residential segregation detected, we highlight the presence of persistent dynamics that exclude ethnic minorities from the wealthiest areas of the city. The most relevant case is that of the Chinese, clustering in some peripheral areas north of the historic centre, where they have established an enclave economy, often making their residence coincide with their workplace and running commercial activities mostly directed towards their compatriots. The Egyptians, constituting the most numerous foreign group in the city, show a completely different settlement pattern, being more integrated into the social tissue and more scattered throughout the city. In the context of a city strongly polarised between a wealthy centre and progressively deprived peripheral belts, the only foreign groups with a marked presence in the city core are those traditionally employed in domestic work, which are however excluded from life in the public places in which they reside. Overall, the class dimension seems to prevail over the ethnic in shaping population settlement patterns within the city.