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SEGREGACIÓN RESIDENCIAL EN DOS CIUDADES DE LA MACRO REGIÓN SUR DEL PERÚ
MANUEL DAMMERT-GUARDIA, LUIS RIVERA-SEGURA
REVISTA URBANO Nº 49 / MAYO 2024 - OCTUBRE 2024
PÁG. 62 - 77
ISSN 0717 - 3997 / 0718 - 3607
I. INTRODUCTION
Residential segregation (RS, from now on) - understood
as the distribution and concentration patterns of the
population in the region - is one of the most important
fields of analysis in urban studies. RS patterns are
based on socio-economic, demographic, and/or ethnic
criteria to configure opportunity structures that impact
the quality of life. The production of urban space and
the levels of segregation do not depend exclusively
on individual decisions but on the institutional
arrangements of the land and real estate markets,
the location of public investment policies, and the
contextual conditions of each urban agglomeration.
RS “is a multiscale process driven by diverse systemic
mechanisms and contextual factors, their legacies and
transformation, and not by inevitable global forces,
individual behavior, or pure market logic” (Arbaci, 2019,
p5). It depends on each city’s historical trajectory,
multiple dimensions, and institutional arrangements
(Maloutas, 2012). In operational terms, RS refers to the
degree of separation of two or more groups in the same
area (Massey & Denton, 1988).
RS is a field that is not without controversies. Debates
have been identified around whether contemporary
territorial transformations generate conditions for the
increase of RS, large-scale segregation patterns, or
small-scale segregation and socio-spatial fragmentation
(Borsdorf & Hidalgo, 2010; Janoschka, 2002; Prévot
Schapira, 2001; Sabatini et al., 2001), or the relationship
between segregation and inequalities (Ruiz-Tagle &
López, 2014; Sabatini et al., 2020). In methodological
terms, discussions arise on synthetic (such as the
dissimilarity index) and spatial indices (Sánchez &
Gómez, 2021), operationalization (Massey & Denton,
1998), and the impact of the analysis scale on the
results (Marengo & Elorza, 2014; Sabatini et al., 2001),
the use of census tracts or other delimitations. In
addition, whether the RS patterns are similar when
comparing cities of different scales and sizes has
recently been discussed (Garreton et al., 2020; Krupka,
2007; Mayorga, 2021; Monkkonen, 2012).
The following article contributes to these debates
by comparing two regional cities in Peru’s southern
macro-region. The starting point is moving away from
the country’s metropolitan area and capital, Lima, and
its almost 10 million inhabitants, to analyze Tacna and
Arequipa, with populations of around 300,000 and
1 million, respectively (INEI, 2017). These cities were
chosen for the following three reasons: a) Both belong
to the same southern macro-region; b) Arequipa is
the second most populous city in the country; and
c) Both cities have population growth rates higher
than the country’s capital and a significant recent
regional growth. The dimensions are the distribution
and homogeneity/heterogeneity, analyzed from
the socioeconomic variable, taking as a reference
the level of education achieved by the head of
household. The analysis uses spatial and non-
spatial indexes with information from the 2007 and
2017 censuses, and three scales of analysis were
incorporated: block, census area, and district.
The article identifies various debates about RS
in urban studies to delimit its working premises.
Subsequently, the socio-spatial context of the
analyzed cities and the results of the spatial and non-
spatial indices are described. Finally, the article marks
the coexistence of both cities’ large- and small-scale
segregation dynamics as relevant.
II. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK.
Segregation: debates and scales
RS is one of the central topics in urban studies.
In particular, it is a crucial analytical input to
understanding growth models, location patterns,
relationships between social inequalities and urban
form, and the role of the land and housing market,
among other things. In the United States, the racial,
sociocultural, and socioeconomic ethnic components
have been discussed from different angles (Massey
& Denton, 1998). On the other hand, various
adaptations and uses of the analysis models were
made in Latin America to understand Residential
Segregation (Sabatini, Cáceres & Cerda, 2001) from
critical readings (Ruiz Tagle & López, 2014). RS is
associated with multiple processes (de Queiroz,
2017). Among the main topics, the following stand
out: link with “urban informality” (Clichevsky, 2000),
public policies, housing, and land markets (Águila
& Prada, 2020; Prada-Trigo & Andrade, 2022), and
the effects of migration. At the same time, RS is a
structure of opportunities (Katzman, 2001) associated
with dynamics of labor insertion (Niembro et al.,
2019), income generation (Gomes & de Queiroz,
2021), territorial stigmas (Elorza, 2019), citizen
security (Arriagada & Morales, 2006), access to the
labor market (Niembro et al., 2019) and can influence
- albeit ambiguously - social networks (Marques,
2015) and their resources (Otero et al., 2021).