Immigrant population of cities around the world

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by Docere

I'm talking about the foreign born/immigrant population, and not including those who are citizens at birth born "overseas."

For figures comparable across all cities, they should be included, since British and Spanish figures include them by default.

Also, due to the large former colonial empire of France, I think you do not fully understand what a person born abroad with French citizenship at birth is. It's not just the children of French expats born abroad.

It can also be:
- a Vietnamese member of the elites born in Vietnam, but not considered an immigrant because he/she had French citizenship in Vietnam already (at the 1999 census, last time we could count them, there were between 20,000 and 25,000 of them)
- a Muslim binational from Algeria (person who has both a French and Algerian passport) who was born in Algeria and later moved to France: this category includes tens of thousands of people for countries like Algeria, Côte d'Ivoire, Sénégal.

Canada obviously is not going to have anything similar, because it doesn't have a colonial legacy, and its ties with the rest of the world are more recent, but why exactly should these people be excluded from the figures for Paris?

For example: in Côte d'Ivoire there's a strong Lebanese-Syrian community of businessmen. These people moved to Côte d'Ivoire when it was a French colony (and Lebanon, Syria were French protectorates). These people (thousands of them) have now both an Ivorian passport and a French passport (and sometimes also a Lebanese passport). If they move to Paris, they wouldn't be counted as immigrants.

London has the same issue, due to their large former colonial empire and strong ties with many former colonies. That's why their statistical office chooses to publish only the statistics by country of birth, irrespective of the exact nationality, because how exactly do you distinguish an Indian from Uganda who always had a British passport and who lives in London from a Ugandan who acquired British citizenship only after moving to the UK? The British statistical office chooses not to bother with distinguishing them: they are both "Uganda-born".

Take for example Jean-Louis Billon, one of Côte d'Ivoire's most famous politicians (and possible successor of the current president of Côte d'Ivoire). Jean-Louis Billon was born in Côte d'Ivoire. His father was a famous businessman from Côte d'Ivoire (he was himself half White French, half Black Ivorian). His mother, coming from the Ivorian upper bourgeoisie, was herself from an aristocratic family of Mali via her father, whereas her mother was Alsatian! This guy had French citizenship from birth. If he moves to Paris (he probably already owns an appartement there, in fact his mother Kada died in Paris last March), he wouldn't be counted as an immigrant.



There are tens of thousands of people like him who live in a symbiotic ecosystem between France and its former colonies. And it's the same with Britain and its former colonies. For many people, the distinction between "immigrant" and "non-immigrant" is blurred.

For example Antoine Tabet, born in Senegal, from a Lebanese family, who served in the French army, was also a childhood friend of the 1st president of Senegal, Léopold Sédar Senghor, and founded one of Senegal's largest conglomerates (construction, civil engineering, and public works).

[iheartthed]

Originally Posted by Docere

Bruce Willis and LeVar Burton would be considered "German-born" by the UK standard but not by the US standard.

The UK doesn't track something like "citizenship at birth"? I assume that would cover most of the break except for like white South Africans with British lineage.

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

The UK doesn't track something like "citizenship at birth"?

No they don't. In the census they only ask people what passport they currently hold (and many don't hold any passport). To this day, Britain has no ID cards, and so no way to check the citizenship of someone. It's one of those national idiosyncrasies. In the US: "It's our God-given right to own 🞵🞵🞵🞵". In the UK: "It's our God-given right to be free of (continental European) ID cards". I've met some immigrants in the UK who argued vehemently that Britain was the best country on Earth because the state doesn't force you to carry an ID card (I had never realized we, poor European continentals, were living in Hell because of our ID cards).

PS: Recently Labour tried to implement digital ID cards (i.e. not physical ones, but a digital one online), but it was derailed by their populist right (Reform Party). Seriously, like 🞵🞵🞵🞵 in the US, it's an issue that, when you see it from the outside, looks so bizarre and irrational...

[Docere]

And yet you insist on including literal subdivisions of the French state in your "foreign born" figures. They're not even "territories." They're departments. People are not only French citizens at birth. They vote in the presidential elections and have representation in the National Assembly and Senate. Their Olympic athletes play for France.

And INSEE doesn't include them in the immigrant population: https://www.insee.fr/fr/statistiques/8582067?sommaire=8582090&geo=REG-11#ancre-IMG1B_V2_ENS

Unfortunately the ONS makes no distinction between citizens born abroad and foreign born in the UK. I do subtract out the Overseas Territories. Beyond that is moving into guestimates. And certainly the German-born numbers in particular are greatly inflated. But it's really only a handful of listed countries, none of which are near the top of the list, which are likely significantly impacted.

But we're not talking about huge numbers here. Either way you slice it though the London metropolitan area likely has at least 1 million more foreign born (by the core definition, not the extended one) than Paris does. In the foreign born count, it's likely midway between New York and Paris.

[Docere]

Richard Dawkins is of "foreign birth" according to ONS.

[muppet]

Originally Posted by Crawford

Do you consider yourself English tho? Britain isn't a nation-state but English identity is perhaps ethnic?

Yes I do consider myself English. Why ever not? But thank you -it brings up some points.

The fact remains English or British on the census is not necessarily an ethnic category persay, because you can self-identify from any race.

I myself cannot however identify as White English or White British because I'm not White.

While the ONS provides a separate "White: Other" tick-box for European immigrants, any individual can tick "White British/ English" based entirely on their current sense of belonging. You don't need a British passport or ancestry, or proof, or to have been born here. The ONS will immediately accept it and add it to the data.

This brings up the question as to why someone would consider:

1. Someone with foreign ancestry and foreign birth, but who ticked the White British/ English box because they identified as such

2. Someone with a family history of 100+ years living abroad through multiple generations (eg South Africa or Kenya) but moved 'back' to Britain following political change

..and lets pretend they've spent less than half the time in the UK as I have (came here when I was 5), and may even have a foreign accent...

but I'm considered foreign enough to make up the stats, but the others aren't. By dint of race -not experience, nor ancestry, nor time here, nor even culture.

I get it when yes, they are some kid from an army base in Germany, but not all of them are.


At the same time people from British Overseas Territories are not considered foreign in this discussion, despite the majority being Black Caribbean, whose ancestry has for centuries been from Bermuda, the Cayman Islands, Anguilla, British Virgin Islands or Montserrat. Islands that didn't get independence.

It literally is a sliding scale based on race when excluding those who happen to be White and identify as British, while not based on race when excluding those who happen to be from the Overseas British Territories.

[iheartthed]

One thing I find amusing about British census stats is how it separates out (or at least used to) white Irish from white. It's not unlike how U.S. forms treat white Hispanic.

[Docere]

Originally Posted by iheartthed

One thing I find amusing about British census stats is how it separates out (or at least used to) white Irish from white. It's not unlike how U.S. forms treat white Hispanic.

And almost all of them are Irish immigrants or maybe second generation. But that's because it's a rather closed/tick-box "ethnic group" question, not a more open-ended "list all the ancestries in your family tree" question.

On an ancestry basis, Liverpool is as Irish as Boston (maybe more so).

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by Docere

And yet you insist on including literal subdivisions of the French state in your "foreign born" figures. They're not even "territories." They're departments. People are not only French citizens at birth. They vote in the presidential elections and have representation in the National Assembly and Senate.

Can you tell us what you're trying to measure in this thread? Are you trying to:
a- measure the immigrants in a legal sense, in order to write a legal essay about how governments manage immigration?

or b- measure the multicultural diversity of cities?

I thought you were trying to measure the multicultural diversity of cities. In that case, it makes no sense to exclude a Puerto Rican from New York or a Guadeloupean/Martinican from Paris.

Originally Posted by Docere

Their Olympic athletes play for France.

As a matter of fact, the football players from Martinique and Guadeloupe play in the Martinique and Guadeloupe teams at the international level.

Here, the Guadeloupe team forced Canada to a draw in the Gold Cup in 2023.



On the other hand, Northern Irish athletes (British citizens) play in the Ireland team at the Olympic Games.

So you see, it's a bit more complicated than what you imagine.

Oh, and Martinique joined the CARICOM (the Caribbean Community of independent states) in 2026. Do you know any metropolitan French department joining an international organization of sovereign states? For a long time, CARICOM was reluctant to have French overseas departments joining, because they feared France's influence in the CARICOM, but now they have relented and they accept the overseas departments.

New Caledonia and French Polynesia are also member states of the Pacific Community. The Pacific Community actually happens to have its headquarters in Nouméa, New Caledonia. Yet the people from New Caledonia and French Polynesia who live in Paris are not counted as immigrants since, legally speaking, they are not immigrants. That excludes 4,100 people from the Paris figures, and reduces the South Pacific community in Paris to almost nothing. Again, what's the point of doing that if you intend to describe the multicultural diversity of cities?

[muppet]

Originally Posted by New Brisavoine

After all these years, you still don't seem to understand how metro areas work.

Provins (your first picture) is included in the Paris metro area, because a large enough percentage of its population in employment commute to Paris and suburbs for work. Dover and Canterbury have extremely small percentages of people commuting to London for work. At the 2011 census, only 2.3% of the people in the Dover District and 4.8% of the people in the Canterbury District commuted to Greater London. The percentages must not be much higher now. In comparison, at the same 2011 census, 18.9% of people in the canton of Provins commuted to the central area of 1,572 km² for Paris.

If we're going to include the entire Kent and the entire Berkshire in an extravagant London metro area, then the Lille metro area has 7 million inhabitants. Is Lille a larger city than Barcelona and similar in size to Madrid?

Once again, the FUA's can increase or decrease the commute levels dependant on the catchment size.

France has very small units (34,000 communes in the country, averaging 4 sq miles says it all) and can isolate the urban villages and towns, knitting them together like a web. This means places like Melun, Meaux, Mantes-la-Jolie, and Creil 20 miles or more from the centre, get to count as part of the urban core, and any nearby town that commutes to them will get included, or by dint of proximity if in between.

Crouy-sur-Ourcq sends 15% of its workforce 14 miles away to Meaux, who sends 15% of its workforce 25 miles away into Paris proper. This 'cœur de l’aire' rule ensures the chain reaction.

NYC we barely need to mention -it has huge catchments, taking the entire county (some twice the size of London) regardless of the many towns and villages in there who don't commute into the main city.

Meanwhile British Local Authorities only number 360, and average 250 sq miles. London's units are the sizes that will:

1. Be too low on the density threshold despite being well above the commute threshold, and despite being high density towns. However they're excluded because their local authority will count the surrounding countryside rather than the town boundaries. As mentioned before Woking (103,000, 22% commute into London) and Brentwood (77,000, 36% commute in) are such examples.

2. Will be so large they count as 'cities' in themselves, once again despite sending enough commuters into London. It does not have the Pôle-to-Pôle effect of Paris, and actually creates the opposite -any nearby towns will get excluded because they send more of their commuters to these new 'magnets'.

This is why Slough (158,000, 30% commuting into London) is excluded despite being contiguous, why Maidenhead & Windsor (153,000) and Twyford are too because they're too near Reading (233,000).
Reading wouldn't normally count because only 14% commute into London. However if Slough was included this would rise to 19%. Once Slough's included then Reading is, then so is Twyford and so on.

This is the effect London is denied, by dint of unit size. Paris creates for itself polycentric 'cores', London creates polycentric 'anti-cores'.

Ergo FUA counts are not consistent between authorities -they don't even have a base unit of measurement, thus creating distortions.

[Docere]

Country of birth and ethnic group (at least 1000):

Born in Poland

Other White 650,259
White British 73,685

Born in Germany

White British 149,838
Other White 82,778
Black African 5,239
Mixed/Multiple 7,596
Pakistani 3,815
Indian 1,657

Born in France

Other White 97,124
White British 20,843
Mixed/Multiple 10,424
Black African 7,101
Black Caribbean 1,810


^ Too much of a difference between the people from three European countries declaring "White British" to believe it's randomly distributed among white immigrants to the UK who tick the white box and "feel British." Germany has nearly twice as many White British responses as Other White responses. Other White outnumbers White British 5-1 among those born in France, Poland nearly 10-1.

There's also hardly any people born in Poland who are nonwhite. The French-born reflect France's more cosmopolitan population.

Would it shock me to learn there's say 100,000 British military folk and their families born in Germany living in the UK? Not really.

[muppet]

Sure, feel free to attribute the bulk of the Germans if you want, but once again, you can't lump everyone as being the same ilk -Poles, French, Romanians, South Africans, Kenyans, Lithuanian etc, to exclude them all.

PS You'd also need to do the equivalent for the other cities too if so.

[muppet]

Originally Posted by Docere

Richard Dawkins is of "foreign birth" according to ONS.

Yes, as is Mo Farah

[sopas ej]

Originally Posted by Docere

There's also hardly any people born in Poland who are nonwhite. The French-born reflect France's more cosmopolitan population..

Let's remember that the vast majority of France's non-white population are either from former French colonies or descendants of people from former French colonies; these people had to go to the "mother" country to seek economic opportunities after the mother country exploited the people and resources in their colonized areas; they otherwise wouldn't have a reason to leave their homelands.

Poland was never a colonial power.

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by sopas ej

Let's remember that the vast majority of France's non-white population are either from former French colonies or descendants of people from former French colonies; these people had to go to the "mother" country to seek economic opportunities after the mother country exploited the people and resources in their colonized areas; they otherwise wouldn't have a reason to leave their homelands.

You are confusing the British, Spanish, Portuguese colonial empires with the French colonial empire (at least the 2nd colonial empire).

The 2nd colonial empire of France was never about economic exploitation. It was merely about political assertion ("a great power must have colonies and cannot be outshone by the UK"), and protection of Christian minorities (that played a large role in the French colonisation of Vietnam). The thought of exploiting (or developing from scratch) local resources only came later, ex post, to justify the costs of establishing the colonial empire (because there was a very big party in France that was hostile to colonial expansion, and these people needed to be placated by the colonial party, so the colonial party had to "prove" that the colonies were profitable to France).

It was the same for the German colonial empire: it was merely developed to assert German power and importance as a great power, not for economic reasons.

The 1st French colonial empire was entirely different, it was colonization to exploit/develop local resources and make a profit. Ironically, most of the colonies from the 1st French colonial empire are still part of France (Guadeloupe, Martinique, Réunion, French Guiana), and the only significant independent country from this 1st colonial empire is Haiti, whose immigrants in France are only a small fraction of the total of immigrants in France. And obviously also Canada and Louisiana, which don't really send migrants to France.

So: 1st French colonial empire = British/Spanish/Portuguese/Dutch colonial empires --> economic motives (but this empire contributes only to a small fraction of immigrants in France).

2nd French colonial empire = German colonial empire (but totally different from British/Dutch/Belgian colonial empires) --> primarily political motives (economic exploitation merely an afterthought, and colonial historians have shown that this 2nd French colonial empire was never profitable to France, unlike the 1st one which was immensely profitable to France; the 2nd colonial empire cost more overall than what France gained from it, and it probably delayed French economic development by diverting French capital towards unproductive colonies).

But the irony of this, because history is often ironic, is that migration flows to France now are largely shaped by this 2nd colonial empire, whereas the 1st one is largely forgotten.

[Docere]

Originally Posted by muppet

Sure, feel free to attribute the bulk of the Germans if you want, but once again, you can't lump everyone as being the same ilk -Poles, French, Romanians, South Africans, Kenyans, Lithuanian etc, to exclude them all.

PS You'd also need to do the equivalent for the other cities too if so.

See post #1. I haven't updated Greater London except for taking out the rather negligible 8,000 or so from Overseas Territories. So I don't know hat you mean about "excluding them all." Nothing else got "struck off." So if anything the list is being "generous" to London (Germany wouldn't get completely knocked off the list but it's certainly on the "overly generous" side. So is Singapore and a few others). But worrying about say the India figure being say 2% more than it "should be" is a waste of time.

Again I don't think the difference would be dramatic except for a handful of countries. The London metropolitan area has about 4 million foreign born give or take.

[Docere]

Originally Posted by sopas ej

Let's remember that the vast majority of France's non-white population are either from former French colonies or descendants of people from former French colonies; these people had to go to the "mother" country to seek economic opportunities after the mother country exploited the people and resources in their colonized areas; they otherwise wouldn't have a reason to leave their homelands.

Poland was never a colonial power.

True!

[muppet]

Originally Posted by Docere

See post #1. I haven't updated Greater London except for taking out the rather negligible 8,000 or so from Overseas Territories. So I don't know hat you mean about "excluding them all." Nothing else got "struck off." So if anything the list is being "generous" to London (Germany wouldn't get completely knocked off the list but it's certainly on the "overly generous" side. So is Singapore and a few others). But worrying about say the India figure being say 2% more than it "should be" is a waste of time.

Again I don't think the difference would be dramatic except for a handful of countries. The London metropolitan area has about 4 million foreign born give or take.

It really isn't about the figures persay, but why the constant sliding scale, and the focus to taking off this and that for one city but not others. For a while London was on a metro list as the only city proper - I got to call that out.

I don't think anyone mentioned the amount of army kids born on US bases, or French born abroad and returning (rightfully so imo)?

PS 4.8m at low estimate in half the catchment, 98 major communities

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by muppet

Once again, the FUA's can increase or decrease the commute levels dependant on the catchment size.

France has very small units (34,000 communes in the country, averaging 4 sq miles says it all) and can isolate the urban villages and towns, knitting them together like a web.

This last sentence means nothing. What is "can isolate the urban villages and towns, knitting them together like a web" supposed to mean? Just because French communes are smaller than English districts, it would make the Paris FUA larger? How so exactly?

Besides, the figure I gave you for Provins is not the % of commuters in the commune of Provins, but the % of commuters in the canton of Provins (which is as large as an English district).

Originally Posted by muppet

This means places like Melun, Meaux, Mantes-la-Jolie, and Creil 20 miles or more from the centre, get to count as part of the urban core, and any nearby town that commutes to them will get included, or by dint of proximity if in between.

Crouy-sur-Ourcq sends 15% of its workforce 14 miles away to Meaux, who sends 15% of its workforce 25 miles away into Paris proper. This 'cœur de l’aire' rule ensures the chain reaction.

The London FUA is also made up of several separate cores. There is the central core of London, and then there are satellite cores:
St Albans
Harlow
Southend-on-Sea
Tunbridge Wells
Woking

Southend-on-Sea is 35 miles from London.

Any district that sends more than 15% of its workforce to Southend-on-Sea is included in the London FUA. So there is your "chain reaction" too!

Originally Posted by muppet

1. Be too low on the density threshold despite being well above the commute threshold, and despite being high density towns. However they're excluded because their local authority will count the surrounding countryside rather than the town boundaries. As mentioned before Woking (103,000, 22% commute into London) and Brentwood (77,000, 36% commute in) are such examples.

Woking is treated as an urban core, satellite of the London urban core. Any district sending more than 15% of its workforce to Woking is included in the London FUA.

Brentwood is part of the commuter belt of London (it sends more than 15% of its workforce to either London or the other urban cores), so it is part of the London FUA.

Originally Posted by muppet

2. Will be so large they count as 'cities' in themselves, once again despite sending enough commuters into London. It does not have the Pôle-to-Pôle effect of Paris, and actually creates the oppsite -any nearby towns will get excluded because they send more of their commuters to these new 'magnets'.

This is why Slough (158,000, 30% commuting into London) is excluded despite being contiguous, why Maidenhead & Windsor (153,000) and Twyford are too because they're too near Reading (233,000).

That's something you've invented in your head. The principle of the FUA is precisely to be detached from administrative boundaries. Whether Slough is one English district, or 12 independent French communes, makes no difference. The 12 independent French communes would be treated as just ONE urban area, and then the % of commuters from this urban area to London would be determined (for example, the urban core of Melun is made up of 5 communes: Dammarie-Les-Lys, Le Mée-Sur-Seine, Melun, Rubelles, and Vaux-Le-Pénil, and statisticians then determine whether these 5 communes combined send more than 15% of their workforce to the central core of Paris, not whether each one individually sends 15% to the central core of Paris).

If Slough is not part of the London FUA, that has nothing to do with how it's administratively ruled, it's only because Slough sends less than 15% of its workforce to the London core and other satellite cores of London.

[New Brisavoine]

Originally Posted by Docere

Again I don't think the difference would be dramatic except for a handful of countries. The London metropolitan area has about 4 million foreign born give or take.

Judging from the Paris figures, the difference for London could be half a million. That's more people than many European cities' entire populations.

There's only one solution to this: we cannot subtract the non-immigrants from the London foreign-born figures for lack of data, but we can add the non-immigrants to the immigrant figures of other cities, which is what I've done to make it entirely comparable with the London figures.

PS: Europe is not North America. Eurostat publishes foreign-born figures for all EU cities INCLUDING the non-immigrants. Whether you like it or not, that's what's done in Europe (only INSEE here is being particular in hiding the non-immigrant figures, but when they have to submit figures to Eurostat, they include everybody, immigrants and non immigrants, because that's the EU-wide rule).

Figures here for the FUAs, as published by Eurostat: