Summary

Most of the focus of this book has been on ethnic segregation, reflecting the discourse found in the media and prominent in government policy documents. However, there is a strong intersectionality between social and ethnic dis-/advantage, which means processes of socio-economic separation are linked to patterns of ethnic segregation in ways that are not easily disentangled. The purpose of this chapter is not to try and do so but, instead, to look for evidence that within ethnic groups, and within a system of constrained school choice, the more or less affluent have different amounts of segregation from other ethnic groups, with this being related to the different types of school they attend. That evidence is found with those of the White British who are not eligible for free school meals (FSMs) generally the most segregated from /least exposed to other ethnic groups, with the effects of academically selective and some religiously selective schools contributing to the differences.

Introduction

To this point, the book has focused on ethnic segregation, with only passing mention of socio-economic segregation and the idea that people of different incomes, affluence or class can reside and be educated separately from one another. Socio-economic and ethnic segregation are intertwined. The spatial inequalities that divide people by wealth and social background sustain and are sustained by inequalities between ethnic groups too. Hence, there is a strong intersectionality between social and ethnic dis-/advantage, as Reni Eddo-Lodge (2017), among others, has eloquently articulated (see Chapter 1). But, despite the overlap, the concepts of ethnic and socio-economic segregation are not exactly reducible to each another. To talk of ethnic segregation is to look more at where people of different ethno-cultural backgrounds are living and attending schools; to talk of socio-economic segregation is to consider the same but for people of different socio-economic positions and/or class.

The attention we have given to ethnic segregation is a reflection of how segregation is conveyed in recent government policy documents. However, it is also the same focus that has been criticized – rightly – for ignoring or, at least, downplaying the socio-economic factors that generate inequalities of opportunity for different ethnic groups and create geographically differentiated outcomes in regard to employment, health, housing, health, the criminal justice system, education and so forth, all of which affect where people live and go to school.