Types of spatial mobility and the ethnic context of destination neighbourhoods in Estonia

Types of spatial mobility and the ethnic context of destination neighbourhoods in Estonia

Mägi, K. (TU Delft OLD Urban Renewal and Housing; University of Tartu)
Leetmaa, K
Tammaru, T. (TU Delft OLD Urban Renewal and Housing; University of Tartu)
van Ham, M. (TU Delft OLD Urban Renewal and Housing; University of St Andrews)

2016-06-28

Background: Most studies of the ethnic composition of destination neighbourhoods after residential moves do not take into account the types of moves people have made. However, from an individual perspective, different types of moves may result in neighbourhood environments which differ in terms of their ethnic composition from those in which the individuals previously lived.

Objective: We investigate how the ethnic residential context changes for individuals as a result of different types of mobility (immobility, intra-urban mobility, suburbanisation, and long-distance migration) for residents of the segregated post-Soviet city of Tallinn. We compare the extent to which Estonian and Russian speakers integrate in residential terms.

Methods: Using unique longitudinal Census data (2000-2011) we tracked changes in the individual ethnic residential context of both groups.

Results: We found that the moving destinations of Estonian and Russian speakers diverge. When Estonians move, their new neighbourhood generally possesses a lower percentage of Russian speakers compared with when Russian speakers move, as well as compared with their previous neighbourhoods. For Russian speakers, the percentage of other Russian speakers in their residential surroundings decreases only for those who move to the rural suburbs or who move over longer distances to rural villages.

Contribution: By applying a novel approach of tracking the changes in the ethnic residential context of individuals for all mobility types, we were able to demonstrate that the two largest ethnolinguistic groups in Estonia tend to behave as ‘parallel populations’ and that residential integration remains slow.

Estonia
ethnic segregation
intra-urban moves
migration
spatial integration
suburbanisation

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:ffb1d139-910f-41c9-ba12-cddc01fd8356

https://doi.org/10.4054/DemRes.2016.34.41

1435-9871

Demographic Research, 34, 1161-1192

This research received funding from the following sources: Institutional Research Grant No. IUT2-17 of the Ministry of Education and Science Estonia; Grant No. 9247 of the Estonian Science Foundation; the European Research Council under the EU FP7 Programme (FP/2007-2013) / ERC Grant Agreement n. 615159 (ERC Consolidator Grant DEPRIVEDHOODS, Socio-spatial inequality, deprived neighbourhoods, and neighbourhood effects), the Marie Curie programme under the EU FP7 Programme (FP/2007-2013) / Career Integration Grant n. PCIG10-GA-2011-303728 (CIG Grant NBHCHOICE, Neighbourhood choice, neighbourhood sorting, and neighbourhood effects). The authors also owe special thanks to Professor Liina -Mai Tooding from the University of Tartu for her advice on statistical modelling, to Raivo Aunap for his cartographic advice,and to the anonymous referees whose comments helped clarify the arguments of the paper.

Institutional Repository

journal article

© 2016 K. Mägi, K Leetmaa, T. Tammaru, M. van Ham