Ethnicity, socio-cultural change, and housing needs

Polyethnic societies present some key implications for planners. Discrimination against, and harassment of, minorities is worryingly universal, and planning professions in all societies need to recognize and address these issues. Planning practice needs to reflect an awareness of the implications of difference while incorporating an understanding of processes of social change in relation to minority and migrant groups, specifically, changes in household size and/or structure and orientation toward the housing market. The core empirical data of the paper comes from the 1991 Census of Population and a major study of housing needs in a large district in northern England. Although focused substantively on British debates and data, most of the concerns addressed in this paper have an element of universality.