Project leader: Gwilym Pryce, University of Sheffield, United Kingdom
Project duration: 2020-2024
Participating countries: Sweden, Norway and the United Kingdom
Funding from NordForsk: 12,423,347 NOK
Project website: Life at the Frontier
The aim of the project was to understand the role of so-called “social frontiers” in determining the social mobility and integration of migrants and other groups. Social frontiers arise when neighbouring communities are very different in terms of their cultural, ethnic and/or social make-up, and the spatial transition in these characteristics is abrupt, rather than gradual. Social frontiers were linked to anxiety, depression, and crime. Using qualitative and quantitative methods, a multidisciplinary team studied these effects, collaborating with local and national stakeholders to inform policy and promote successful integration by improving social, educational, and economic outcomes for migrants and marginalised groups.
Key Findings
- Integration means equal chances in jobs, housing, education, and health, not just effort from migrants themselves. But if society is already divided by class, income, race, or religion, integration becomes harder.
- Refugee policies have mixed results: Norway’s dispersal policy gave only small job benefits, while Scotland’s wider access to social housing reduced homelessness among refugees. In contrast, large-scale evidence from the UK shows that people with Asian or Polish names face clear discrimination when applying for housing.
- Migration patterns are highly persistent over time, as shown in Scotland across 40 years, making it difficult to break down segregation through policy alone.
- Where migrants and majority groups live next to each other matters: gradual mixing can support both community ties and wider opportunities, while sharp divides (“social frontiers”) often increase tension, prejudice, and territorial behaviour.
- Neighbourhoods on the migrant side of frontiers are often disadvantaged with poorer housing, public spaces, and safety. They are also linked to worse mental health outcomes (such as higher depression rates), especially for Pakistani and other minority residents in England and Wales.
- Social frontiers have clear economic effects: lower house prices nearby, lower incomes for migrant men in Oslo, and reduced job mobility for both migrants and natives living close to them.
- Letting agents may be reinforcing divides by steering minority applicants into minority areas near frontiers, keeping residential separation in place over time.
Key outputs
Andersen, H. L., Osland, L., & Zhang, M. L. (2023). Labour market integration of refugees and the importance of the neighbourhood: Norwegian quasi-experimental evidence. Journal for Labour Market Research, 57(1), 16. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12651-023-00341-y
Binner, A., Timmins, C., Pryce, G. (2024) Research Briefing: Discrimination in the UK Private Rented Sector, ‘Life at the Frontier’ (LATF) Research Briefing 2. Sheffield: University of Sheffield.
Iyer, A., & Pryce, G. (2024). Theorising the causal impacts of social frontiers: The social and psychological implications of discontinuities in the geography of residential mix. Urban Studies, 61(5), 782-798. https://doi.org/10.1177/00420980231194834
Olner, D., Pryce, G., van Ham, M., & Janssen, H. (2024). The conflicting geographies of social frontiers: Exploring the asymmetric impacts of social frontiers on household mobility in Rotterdam. Environment and Planning B: Urban Analytics and City Science, 51(3), 625-640. https://doi.org/10.1177/23998083231173696
Piekut A, Pryce G, Rasool Z, Staples H. (2024). Research Briefing: Social frontiers and community life in Rotherham West, ‘Life at the Frontier’ (LATF) Research Briefing 1.
Sheffield: University of Sheffield.
Zhang M, Piekut A, Rasool Z, Warden L, Staples H, Pryce G, (2024). Using residents and experts to evaluate the validity of areal wombling for detecting social boundaries: A small scale feasibility study. PloS one, 19 (8), pp. e0305774 https://doi.org/10.1371/journal. pone.0305774