Ethnic segregation and the housing market in two cities in Northern and Southern Europe: the cases of Amsterdam and Barcelona

Abstract

Uneven urban geographies of different immigrant or ethnic groups have received ample attention across the world; however in Southern Europe the picture is as yet unclear. Most Southern European countries recently experienced a new phase in their modern history because they became net immigrant receivers after having been net ‘deliverers’ of migrants for many decades. This opens the question what direction this migration will take and what the implications for the segregation in cities will be. One of the crucial questions in that respect is what the implications will be for the functioning of the housing market. Will some parallels develop with what occurred in Northern Europe? Or will there be a development with an own character. In this article we aim to contribute to answering these questions through a comparison of the segregation and housing relation in the cities of Amsterdam and Barcelona.