Black suburbanization in the 1980s

On basis of research that indicated a marked increase in levels of residential integration, many social scientists working with data from 1970s concluded that pattern of residential racial segregation characteristic of United States was eroding (for example, Massey and Denton 1987; McKinney 1989). This conclusion led to hope that greater contact between races would lead to less discrimination (Farley 1991). This optimism was fueled by growth of a black middle class (Landry 1987) and by concomitant expansion in blacks' ability to compete for housing in a larger range of neighborhoods and communities. Indeed, evidence of increased racial integration during 1970s was found in each of geographical contexts (central cities, suburban areas, and movement of individuals between two) that inform most studies of racially defined residential patterns. More recent studies, however, have doused earlier optimism. For example, although Massey and Gross (1991) noted a general increase in urban integration, they suggested that integration arose mainly in areas where comparatively few blacks live and where preferences for limited interracial contact are not threatened by racial desegregation (p. 15). Moreover, because of low total numbers of blacks in these areas, probability of black-white interaction remained low, even as level of integration increased. Cities with large numbers of blacks, such as Chicago or Detroit, had little increase in integration; some cities, such as New York, became even more segregated. In a similar vein, Smith (1991) found that most integration in central cities was concentrated in what he termed and was temporary-a way station in transition of communities from predominantly white to predominantly black. These turnover tracts constituted most of central-city areas that appeared to be integrating. Additional indications of residential integration by blacks in 1970s emerged from research that showed large numbers of blacks moving from central cities to suburbs (Clay 1979; Rose 1976). The suburban black population increased faster than central-city black population over decade (Long and DeAre 1981). The extent of this change was so dramatic that it has been compared to movement of whites to suburbs in years following World War II (Frey 1985). Galster (1991), however, demonstrated that although blacks in 1970s indeed moved to suburbs in large numbers, they gained access primarily to suburbs adjacent to central cities. Because whites are likely to move increasingly farther out on urban fringe, Galster argued that the average black