How Residential Patterns Affect Intergroup Relations

How residential patterns affect intergroup relations 

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How residential patterns affect intergroup relations 

Intergroup relations which are the relationships between diverse groups of people vary along a continuum between intolerance and tolerance. The form of intergroup relation that is most tolerant is pluralism in which there is no difference between the majority and minority groups but rather there is the same standing. At the other end of the spectrum is expulsion, amalgamation or even genocide which is an instance of intolerant group relations (Hogg & Abrams, 2001).

In this paper am going to analyze the city of San Diego. San Diego is may be the most charming city situated in major southern California society. It is the city that is most southerly among all the pacific coast cities of America. The proximity of the city to a foreign country has only had a little effect on its culture. Just like other south California cities, San Diego has a Spanish early history. The city was claimed from Spain. The earlier economic development of the city followed the railroad promotion fortunes, just like most of southern California cities. However, unlike majority of the southern communities, San Diego did not a main line society but rather has grown as a resort society for people who have retired. Main activities additionally to catering and resort sponsors have been connected to the founding of a main naval base and a very significant fishing industry. All these influences give character to the city as opposed to forces that are generated by enthusiastic economic growth of other communities. Life is somehow easier in San Diego and possibly basic attitudes are less effortlessly replaced in favor of new circumstances both political and economic.

Part 1: secondary data

Education

        The school system of the city of San Diego is good. A lot of efforts have been put to emphasize the significance of intercultural education to the teachers and there is proof of real interest in racial subjects by this staff. The hiring of a number of professional Negros has assisted in putting fair play and lessons of tolerance into the practice. There is no other government or community department that enjoys much confidence among the minority groups as the public school system of the city. Citizens from the minority groups feel that the educational practice, policy and attitude are on the consistent, sound and whole. This is correct except that some teachers have not endorsed the educational importance of the race relationships in a society that is democratic and few people maintain different degree of earlier intolerance. Nevertheless, the leadership is good and clearly both the administrative staff and school board have worked harmoniously on the subject of intercultural education.

Population

The population of San Diego has rapidly grown in the early 20th century. However, an analysis of the current population increase shows that a shift in behavior of the population has occurred during the war years. There is a noticed decrease for instance that is shown in the older age groups and a rise in the very young age groups as well as the middle age groups. The change in the character of the migration to San Diego is probably going to strengthen these groups which are interested in the development of the city as an industrial center. Another feature of the population rise is the west south states predominance as a point of origin for new comers. The population of Negros in San Diego was also high before the war but after the war influx it has drastically reduced.

Housing

        In mid 20th century, the city of San Diego was equipped with over 60,000 dwelling units of which 37.5 percent were more than 20m years old, 15.5 percent were more than 30 years old and more than six percent were built before the beginning of the 20th century. Slightly over 6,000 units did not have private bath capacities. About 4,000 units required major renovations. More units were constructed between 1940 and 1944 of which some were temporary units that were constructed by the national government agencies to be dismantled when the war ends. In these four years, there was a 21 percent increase in permanent units when compared to 41 percent increase in the population (Reitz, Phan, & Banerjee, 2009). The entire number of housing units increased with 44 percent that included temporary housing. In terms of permanency and comfort, San Diego is currently badly under housed. Racially biased housing practices have defined San Diego’s demographic landscape. In many of the city’s neighborhoods, limitations on who might buy homes were clearly put down into a property’s deeds by a society’s developer. Racially restraining covenants, as they are called, were famous and severely enforced in several communities.

Race

        San Diego comprises diverse ethnicities including Mexicans, Negros, Portuguese, Italian and Asians with Negros and Mexicans being the major ones. The minority races face discrimination and do not trust the treatment which they might expect from the government agencies. Some groups have said that when matters involving white intolerance have raised in some of these agencies and the professional staff there makes concessions to the white at the expense of the Mexicans and the Negros. The minority groups also mistrust the handpicking of Negro representatives by the white plan committees and boards of a number of agencies. There are also other minority nationalities, cultural and racial groups other than the Mexicans and the Negros. These groups can be grouped as one of the relations to the society is not of the exact status of the colored groups and may be colored groups whose numbers are adequately small so that they might be considered. It is hard to obtain an exact estimate of the number of the Portuguese and Italian group but they are estimated to be more than 10,000 people. The Italian are not more than 8,000 people and the Asians not more than 3,000 people.

Part 2: observational data

        As I was walking through the city of San Diego, it is clear that the city is densely populated. The urban area of the city extends beyond the administrative city boundaries. The economy of the city is geared by activities related to defense and military, international trade, tourism and manufacturing. The racial composition of the city comprises of majority whites, followed by African American, Native Americans and Asians as well as other several minority groups. It is clear that majority of the people are not in stable economic condition. It has a very huge number of homeless population most of them being veterans in the United States (Patricia, 2012). The minority groups seem to be on the decrease. There are more people in the older age group followed by people from the middle age and very few youths. The school situation in the city is that the schools have developed to be more segregated for the Latino and the black students as the number of Latinos have gushed. Majority of the blacks and the Latinos join greatly segregated schooling environments in schools where by 90 -100 percent of the learners are not well represented from minority backgrounds. Only about five percent of Asian students from south California go to greatly segregated schools. Racial segregation also seems to have been mirrored by the language and economic segregation. This poses a challenge to language students as they do not get exposed to a lot of fluent classmates.