Gemma Catney PhD Research Student School of Geography, Archaeology and Palaeoecology (GAP)

1. Population change in a ‘divided society’: internal migration, residential segregation and contested discourses in Northern Ireland Gemma Catney PhD Research Student School of Geography, Archaeology and Palaeoecology (GAP) Queen’s University, Belfast, UK 4th International Population Geographies Conference, Hong Kong, July 2007

2. NI ‘conflict’ • Religion or community background • Categories used: • Protestant and Catholic • Religion, national identity, politics, culture, history • Segregation: residential, workplace, education, various social milieu • ‘Troubles’ • Led to interpretations as a ‘place apart’

3. Migration within NI • Treatment of migration in the context of the ‘NI problem’ • Sensationalised discourses of Catholic ‘advance’, Protestant ‘retreat’, ‘Orange flight’ • That migration takes place because of ‘segregationist preferences’, and reinforces residential segregation • More ‘typical’ interpretations largely ignored (Anderson and Shuttleworth 1994, 1998 and Power and Shuttleworth 1997)

4. Migration within NI • Intimidation, fear, hostility, etc. likely to play a role for some people in some places • But, in reality, much more ‘normal’ than has been acknowledged • Residential segregation now changing too (despite media assertions): decreasing, or at least not increasing

5. Migration within NI • So need to understand migration as a PROCESS • Two inter-related foci: • The relationship between migration and religion (CB) in NI • The impact internal migration has on residential segregation (reinforcement, erosion or creation?) • Under-explored and little understood

6. Presentation outline • The geography of migration in NI • Mobility differentials • Migration rates • Internal migration and ‘religion’ • Migration rates by community background • Local regression (GWR) • SI modelling • Motivations, choice and constraint • Conclusions

7. Religion question Community background as alternative

8. Mobility differentials

11. Net migration by CB Catholic net migration rate (per 1000 pop.) Protestant net migration rate (per 1000 pop.)

12. Global regression: migration and residential composition

13. What is GWR? • Normal regression assumes that a relationship between variables holds at each location • Geographically Weighted Regression (GWR) accounts for spatial variations in the relationships between variables • GWR produces regression coefficients at (the centroid of) each selected location, facilitating an assessment of how the relationship between a set of variables changes from place to place

14. GWR and migration • Local variations in the regression between demographic composition and in- and out-migration not accounted for with global regression • Useful in understanding these relationships, and in predicting future change • % residents by community background and by community background as proportion of all in- and out-migration

15. GWR: Catholic residents against Catholic in-migration

16. GWR interpretation • Confusing picture! • Classifications useful to manage outputs and pick out major trends • Standard rates allow us to measure gains and losses of a given group • But need another approach if want to further understand how a group is changing (e.g. through in- or out-migration, majority/minority differences, etc.) • GWR allows consideration of these issues • Using predictions for a given value for the independent (res comp)

18. Spatial interaction modelling results (in brief!)

19. Need to disentangle relative importance of and potential interplay between motivations, choice and constraint 1. Motivations for migration Little evidence for ‘flight’ Likely that more ‘typical’ reasons are important Further probing through qualitative research

20. 2. Choice and constraint What informs the residential choice of migrants? How far is residential composition important?

21. Qualitative research Selected case study areas (Belfast) • Semi-structured interviews with: • residents of case study areas (movers and non-movers) • key informants – property developers, community representatives, etc. • Plus additional focus groups (and mental mapping exercise)

22. Transect: South Belfast

23. Insights from qualitative research • Migration for more ‘typical’ reasons by far dominant : • Employment; life course factors – more space, garden, etc; increased prosperity; health reasons; etc. • Some movement for ‘sectarian’ reasons – intimidation mainly • Where changes in the ‘religious’ composition of a neighbourhood was cited, this was often one of many reasons, and/or associated with other n’hood changes, eg. The area had become “rougher” (Adapted from Anderson and Shuttleworth 1998: 192)

24. Insights from qualitative research • More evidence that community background was important in choice of relocation, not the decision to move • In some cases, this may have been to areas in which the mover was in a majority by CB • But often this was to areas they perceived as mixed • Even then, not all cited this as important (either way) • Other factors more important in area choice: e.g. fulfilment of factors which motivated movement (e.g. closer to work, larger property, etc.) and other, additional factors (e.g. sense of community or privacy, rural living, etc.)

25. Insights from qualitative research • Choice and constraint Why was community background important to some migrants in their choice of a new place of residence? • Fewer cases of ‘pure’ sectarianism or intolerance • Much more was fear of harassment, feeling would not be welcome, and misunderstanding between the two communities “Completely Catholic areas. Because, I mean, I wouldn’t get a chance to live in it” (Protestant female, 40, Protestant area) “Areas that I would discount right away would be predominantly Protestant, Loyalist areas. I mean, that wouldn’t be an option…I think there’d be great unease for people moving into an area that’s not somewhere where they are drawn from that community” (Catholic male, 50, Catholic area) • Some discussed how mixing desirable, but felt could not move into a mixed area • Institutional constraints?

26. Conclusions • Some insight into the geography of migration in NI • Methods for exploring the relationship between internal migration and residential segregation • Variable from place to place, but broadly suggests a decline in segregation due (at least in part) to migration • ‘Religion’ less important in migration decision-making and location choice than frequently asserted in particular representations • Where does appear to be important, need to understand the possible interplay between motivations, choice and constraint • Allied research: ‘White flight’ and ‘self-segregation’ challenged in important research by Phillips (1998, 2006), Simpson (2004, 2007), Stillwell and Phillips (2006)

27. Acknowledgements • My supervisor, Dr Ian Shuttleworth, for his comments and advice • NISRA, for the provision of Census data • Department for Employment and Learning (DEL), for funding • Contested Cities, Urban Universities (CU2) research team and funding body (European Programme Peace 2)