The Spatial Dimension of Segregation: A Case Study in Four French Urban Areas, 1990-1999

The aim of this paper is to analyze the intra-urban spatial segregation in terms of socio-professional categories in four French urban areas: Paris, Lyon, Bordeaux and Dijon. Two questions are investigated. First, how does spatial segregation vary across the four urban poles? Second, what are the spatial patterns of segregation within each urban pole? In order to answer these questions, we compute spatial global segregation indices for socio-professional categories in each urban area, together with entropy indices, which are local segregation indices that reflect the diversity within each unit and that can be mapped to show the spatial variations of segregation among the units of the four urban poles. The results highlight the self-segregation of the managers, the specific features of Paris and the complex spatial distribution of segregation.