Black and White Population Growth in American Suburbs: Transition or Parallel Development?

Abstract

This study examines the impact of black population size and rate of increase on white population change in American suburbs between 1960 and 1970. The data indicate that there is no tipping point. In small suburbs the black population variables interact, while in medium and large suburbs percent black has a moderate additive effect on white population growth and black population increase is unimportant. These patterns persist even when variables causally prior to the white and black population variables are controlled. Finally, in only a few instances within the observed range of percent black or rate of black population increase, or any combination of these variables, was there any absolute decline in the white population. In this paper we examine the relation between the relative size (and changes in size) of the black population and changes in the white population in American suburbs between 1960 and 1970. In particular we ask whether there is any causal connection among these variables and the functional form of any relation. These are important questions for urban policymakers as well as for ecological theory. While the proportion of the suburban population which is black has remained quite stable at about 5 percent for a number of decades, this apparent stability masks the fact that substantial numbers of blacks are moving to suburbs (cf. Connally). From the point of view of policymakers, understanding the relation between white behavior and black population variables is especially important in formulating strategies to influence emergent metropolitan housing patterns. It is important for ecological theory in its potential for understanding the general relation between black and white population expansion. Surprisingly, the literature on this question has been largely confined *The research was partly supported by Grant (MH28815-01) from the Center for Study of Metropolitan Problems of the National Institutes of Mental Health. The authors sincerely thank Martin Patchen and an anonymous referee for their thoughtful and helpful comments on earlier drafts of this paper. C) 1979, University of North Carolina Press. 0037-7732/79/010305-28$02.40