Beyond the Average: Ethnic Diversity and Generalized Trust in a Segregated City

Sweden is one of countries in the world with highest levels of generalized trust and social cohesion. After four decades of generous refugee immigration policy, peaking with the immigration crisis in 2015 with 160 000 asylum seekers, Sweden drastically restricted its immigration laws. Following these events, the political agenda has in a short time changed from being tough on immigration to being tough on immigrants, by emphasizing law and order, the fight against violent crime and what often is labelled parallel societies and neighborhoods at risk. This situation puts issues of generalized trust and social cohesion in a new perspective. One of the most recurrent findings in the comparative politics literature on social trust is the negative relationship between ethnic diversity and generalized trust. This paper follows in this tradition and aims to investigate how ethnic background and ethnic diversity in the neighborhood is associated with generalized trust at the individual level. Despite stable trends in generalized trust at the national level in Sweden, it’s important to go beyond the aggregate average and understand how trust varies across local contexts with very different economic and social conditions. To reach the aim, we test three hypotheses: 1) that generalized trust is higher among natives than foreign born, 2) that trust levels are lower among individuals living in neighborhoods with more ethnic diversity and higher shares of foreign born, and 3) in line with Putnam’s Constrict theory, that the difference in trust levels between natives and foreign born are equally negatively affected by increases in ethnic diversity at the neighborhood level. To answer the research question and test the hypotheses, this paper utilizes unique and high–quality cross–sectional survey data annually collected 2016-2021 in Gothenburg, Sweden’s second largest city, by the SOM Institute at University of Gothenburg. The multi-level regression analyzes are based on survey responses from 17 000 individuals age 16-85, nested in 96 larger neighborhood areas where share of foreign born adults varies from 7 to 80 percent. The preliminary findings suggest that foreign born indeed has slightly lower trust than natives, but this difference is much smaller compared to the difference found between individuals living in different neighborhoods. Also, it’s not ethnic diversity per se that is negatively associated with generalized trust, rather the total share of foreign born in the neighborhood. Additionally, native’s and foreign born’s generalized trust are equally negatively affected by an increase in share of foreign born in the neighborhood. The paper concludes with a discussion on how absent integration policies, particularly regarding housing, has led to a very close connection between economic, social, and ethnic segregation with detrimental effects on generalized trust and local social cohesion.