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Neli Demireva, Ethnic Diversity and Social Cohesion: Immigration, Ethnic Fractionalization and Potentials for Civic Action Merlin Schaeffer, European Sociological Review, Volume 31, Issue 1, February 2015, Pages 133–136, https://doi.org/10.1093/esr/jcu080
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The depth and wealth of information that Merlin Schaeffer’s book ‘Ethnic Diversity and Social Cohesion: Immigration, Ethnic Fractionalization and Potentials for Civic Action’ provides is unquestionably impressive. As Merlin Schaeffer relates in the introductory parts, the literature on the subject of diversity and social capital is vast and yet it continues to grow progressively. To offer a coherent, lucid, and analytical summary of the divergent studies, the methodologies involved and the buzzing beehive of results, thus, look almost like a Herculean task in which Schaeffer however succeeds.
The result is a deceivingly short but very competent and elegant state-of-the-art review that also carries deep consideration for the methodological issues involved, comparisons of how sociology, economics, and social psychology have approached the subject and evidence based on the Ethnic Diversity and Collective Action Survey (EDCAS) analysed by the author. EDCAS is a large-scale computer-assisted telephone interview survey that was conducted in Germany, France, and the Netherlands from October 2009 until July 2010. Using the German data with an immigrant and Turkish oversample (roughly 7500 standardized telephone interviews), Schaeffer illustrates throughout the eight chapters (six substantive ones plus an Introduction and Conclusion) some of the most common problems in the area such as: which diversity index can capture best the extent of ethnic variety in the local area, what constitutes cohesion and what outcomes should be considered—trust and/or political participation, and how does selection bias complicate the interpretation of otherwise seemingly coherent trends. The themes and methods discussed in the book transcend the specific German context and excellently relate to the general debate on the impact of diversity. By no means is this a complete list of the issues with which the author is concerned as I discovered while reading the book—every time I would think that a certain topic has not been dealt with properly, I would discover a section devoted to it 10 pages later. The book replicates some popular models, additionally offering insightful new approaches.