Neighbor interactions and settlement intentions of African Migrants in urban China: A case study of Guangzhou

The presence of African migrants in Chinese cities has attracted extensive scholarly interest. While several studies have noticed a decline in the population of African migrants in Guangzhou along with the recent changes of policies on immigration control, the present study casts new light to the currently remaining African migrants in Guangzhou who are less susceptible to the strict immigration control measures and are more likely to be socially included due to the recent favorable policies. It attempts to investigate what factors can further motivate their willingness to stay permanently in the city, and draws attention to the effects of neighbor interactions given their importance for the African communities in China as recently uncovered. Empirical data on 468 respondents were derived from a questionnaire survey conducted in the Xiaobei area of Guangzhou. Through descriptive and multivariate analyses of the determinants of settlement intentions, the present study finds that neighbor interactions affect the settlement intentions of the two major groups of African migrants, namely overseas students and businessmen, in quite different ways. Better affective neighbor relations are conducive to stronger settlement intentions for businessmen, while such an effect is found insignificant for the overseas students. The present study contributes new insights to the literature on settlement intentions by highlighting the importance of neighborhood supporting systems. It also has the potential to encourage new avenues for further research on the settlement intention of foreign populations in urban China, who are confronted with the constantly changing policy environment on immigration control.