The city and integration of immigrants : Urban planning policies for multicultural cities

1. The city and integration of immigrants : Urban planning policies for multicultural cities Dr. Mohammad Qadeer & Dr. SandeepAgrawal

2. Multiculturalism • Multiculturalism is largely misunderstood in the mass media • Two sided coin: • One side is the right to cultural diversity • The other side is the common ground laws, economy, technology, politics, official languages and civic culture, including national values and everyday norms.

4. Two domains of social life • Public= law, economy, politics, public health and welfare, technology, national culture, and identity, official language(s) and norms and values common across a country. • Private= family and marriage, community affairs, religion, heritage languages, identity, customs and etiquettes.

5. Combinations of cultures of domains • Public Private • Unitary Unitary = Melting pot • Unitary Diverse = Multiculturalism • Diverse Unitary = US of pre civil rights • Diverse Diverse = Apartheid

6. Two sides of multiculturalism • Sub-cultural diversity and common ground • Common ground is the shared legal, economic, political and administrative institutions, infrastructure, and services as well as values of national sweep and mores of everyday behaviour and temperament. Multiculturalism can be practiced only if there is a common ground to negotiate across differences.

7. Multicultural city • It is a city where different (sub)cultural identities and interests are grafted on its geographic and institutional structures as rights. These cultural expressions are imprinted as ethnic enclaves, commercial districts, places of worship and community institutions and incorporated in city politics, economy, laws, symbols and everyday behaviours. Space, infrastructure and services a significant part of the common ground.

8. Multicultural City • City is an instrument of integration through daily encounters with ‘others’. • It acculturates immigrants and in the process absorbs their interests and values in the common ground. • The rights to be different are counterpoised by the imperatives of conforming to the norm and values of societal institutions. • A multicultural city is steeped in the social rights of individuals and communities to cultural differences and religious freedoms. • A multicultural city combines three pillars of the civic organization: diversity, equality and integration.

9. Purpose • To take a measure of how planning practice is responding to cultural diversity; • To examine the planning institutions’ responsiveness to cultural diversity; and • To empirically assess the culturally-sensitive policies adopted by municipalities in the US and Canada using a Multicultural Policy Index.

10. Method • Survey questionnaire based on Policy Index • 109 municipalities were approached (stratified sampling) • 42 (38.5%) responses: 23 US and 19 Canadian municipalities

11. Policy Index Language, representation and inclusion Land use and development Community Services

12. Findings • Canadian large (>500,000) cities have adopted a higher number of policies (15.4 out of possible 19) • Large American cities follow most of the policies (12.6 vs. 15.4)

13. findings • Large and medium size Canadian cities have higher avg. number of policies than American cities • Reverse is the case with respect to small cities • In all sampled cities, land use and development policies tend to be less culturally-sensitive. • Planning process policies are more inclusive • Large and medium size cities follow most of the policies that promote the inclusion of ethnics’ interest and voices in planning decision-making. • Provision of community services is the second most common practice.

14. Findings • Most of the cities have adopted policies aiming at protecting ethnic heritage, including the heritage of indigenous people, promoting ethnic art, culture, fairs and parades, signage and street names. • None adopted any city-wide policies for the development of ethnic neighbourhoods, places of worship and other cultural institutions.

15. findings • % of immigrants has no or weak association with the number of policies adopted. • % of immigrants has no significant affect on the policies adopted in Large and medium size cities. • Small cities show significant correlation between % of immigrants and number of adopted policies.

16. Interpretive discussion • Representation in the planning process • Ethnic minorities are well represented in the decision-making process • Equitable city and reasonable accommodations • Despite low incidence of city wide policies for the development of ethnic places of worship and so on, such developments are pervasive through out Canada and the US. • Restructuring community services and carving a common ground • Cities respond to ethnic diversity in the provision of services but it is largely reactive rather than proactive.

17. Conclusions • Culturally-sensitive planning in North American is a work in progress. • Large- and medium-size cities of metropolitan regions do better on this front than small, exurban municipalities. • Canadian cities are more responsive to culturally diversity than the US cities. • Planning institutions are generally responsive to the demands of diverse communities. • The complexity of balancing diversity, equality and public interests is the challenge of planning practice.