Most and Least Segregated Cities for American Indians and Alaska Natives

Editor’s Note: This post is a follow-up to a series of earlier posts. If you are confused about some of the measures of segregation, you can look at this post from July 2nd where I discuss the different dimensions of residential segregation. That post discusses a few of the methodological issues, and it links to the Census Bureau report where the data comes from. If you link to the actual Census report, they show the statistical formulas that are used in calculating segregation using each method described. They also discuss other issues related to measuring segregation.

You should also keep in mind this is only measuring segregation for American Indians and Alaska Natives, and it’s only measuring urban segregation. If you want to read the previous posts in the series, here is the link.

This is the final post in my series on the dimensions of residential racial segregation. I saved American Indians and Alaska Natives for last because there are some dramatic differences between this group and other groups that affect how we talk about segregation, which I highlight at the end of the post.

The analysis of American Indians and Alaska Natives includes 13 metro areas which met the Census criteria of having at least 3% representation–the number was 43 metros for African Americans, 36 metros for Latinos, and 20 metros for Asians.

All data comes from the US Census Bureau.

Since there are only 13 cities that meet the requirements of the study, I’m going to rank order the metros on each measure.

Evenness (metro areas rank ordered from the least evenly spread to the most evenly spread; the number is the percent of people who would have to move for the group to be evenly distributed across the metro area)

1. Yakima, WA
2. Fort Smith, AR-OK
3. Phoenix-Mesa, AZ
4. Los Angeles-Long Beach, CA
5. Albuquerque, NM
6. Rapid City, SD
7. Bellingham, WA
8. Yuma, AZ
9. Great Falls, MT
10. Anchorage, AK
11. Lawton, OK
12. Tulsa, OK
13. Oklahoma City, OK

Exposure Metros (metro areas rank ordered from the lowest exposure to highest exposure; exposure refers to the likelihood of having contact with whites)

1. Albuquerque, NM
2. Yakima, WA
3. Phoenix-Mesa, AZ
4. Fort Smith, AR-OK
5. Bellingham, WA
6. Anchorage, AK
7. Rapid City, SD
8. Los Angeles-Long Beach, CA
9. Tulsa, OK
10. Yuma, AZ
11. Lawton, OK
12. Oklahoma City, OK
13. Great Falls, MT

Concentration (metro areas ranked from most to least concentrated; concentration refers to how densely concentrated or evenly spread throughout the metro area a group is)

1. Anchorage, AK
2. Rapid City, SD
3. Yuma, AZ
4. Great Falls, MT
5. Pheonix-Mesa, AZ
6. Bellingham, WA
7. Los Angeles-Long Beach, CA
8. Alburquerque, NM
9. Yakima, WA
10. Oklahoma City, OK
11. Tulsa, OK
12. Lawton, OK
13. Fort Smith, AR-OK

5 Most Centralized Metros (cities ranked from most to least centralized; centralization measures proximity to the central core of the city)

1. Yuma, AZ
2. Rapid City, SD
3. Anchorage, AK
4. Great Falls, MT
5. Phoenix-Mesa, AZ
6. Bellingham, WA
7. Los Angeles-Long Beach, CA
8. Tulsa, OK
9. Yakima, WA
10. Albuquerque, NM
11. Oklahoma City, OK
12. Lawton, OK
13. Fort Smith, AR-OK

5 Most Clustered Metros

1. Albuquerque, NM
2. Yakima, WA
3. Phoenix-Mesa, AZ
4. Fort Smith, AR-OK
5. Bellingham, WA
6. Tulsa, OK
7. Lawton, OK
8. Rapid City, SD
9. Yuma, AZ
10. Anchorage, AK
11. Los Angeles-Long Beach, CA
12. Oklahoma City, OK
13. Great Falls, MT

Overall Segregation Levels for American Indians and Alaska Natives (metro areas rank order from most to least segregated)

1. Phoenix-Mesa, AZ
2. Yakima, WA
3. (tie) Rapid City, SD and Albuquerque, NM
4. Bellingham, WA
5. Anchorage, AK
6. Yuma, AZ
7. Fort Smith, AR-OK
8. Los Angeles-Long Beach, CA
9. Great Falls, MT
10. Tulsa, OK
11. Lawton, OK
12. Oklahoma City, OK

A Few Points for Discussion:

American Indians and Alaska Natives stand out for several reasons. First, their levels of urban segregation are much lower than the other groups. On the surface, one could view this as a sign that Native Americans are the most integrated or most accepted of all minority groups, but this really doesn’t provide an accurate picture of the status of American Indians and Alaska Natives. On many measures, such as poverty, certain health status variables, and incarceration rates, American Indians are not doing well at all–their rates are generally the worst in these categories.

So why are Native Americans so integrated compared to Blacks, Latinos, and Asians when they fare so poorly on many indicators of racial equality? I think a big part of the answer is a statistical artifact. Here’s why. Only 58% of Native Americans reside inside urban areas, so 42% of the population is missing from this analysis. People trapped on impoverished nations or in other rural areas are not in this analysis. The people who are in this analysis are “urban Indians.” They are disproportionately people who have left the communities where they were raised and they are disproportionately people who have recently connected or reconnected with their I know 58% may sound like a higher number, but the percentages of Blacks, Asians, and Latinos who live in urban areas are all well over 90%. ((I couldn’t find the exact figures for whites, but the number is somewhere around 80%. Data on urbanization come from Majority-Minority Relations, 5th Ed. by John Farley))

I can’t say exactly how segregated rural American Indians and Alaska Native are. They may be less segregated than rural people from other minority racial/ethnic groups, but in focusing only on urban segregation we missing the major form of segregation that has been forced upon Native Americans–the reservation system. I do understand that many American Indian groups now have their own sovereign nations, so the meaning of reservation is changing. However, the isolation is not changing much. Contrary to racist myths, most American Indians and Alaska Natives are not getting huge cash flows from casinos or huge government handouts. According to the 2000 census, 25.7% of American Indians and Alaska Natives lived in poverty, which is higher than any other racial/ethnic group in the US. ((Some American Indian ethnic groups fared much worse than others–38.9% of Sioux, 37% of Navajo, 33.9% of Apache, and 29% of Pueblo people lived in poverty. To see the full Census Report on American Indians and Alaska Natives click on this link.))