We propose a set of axioms for the measurement of school-based segregation with any number of ethnic groups. These axioms are motivated by two criteria. The first is evenness: how much do ethnic groups’ distributions across schools differ? The second is representativeness: how different are schools’ ethnic distributions from one another? We prove that a unique ordering satisfies our axioms. It is represented by an index that was originally proposed by Henri Theil (1971). This “Mutual Information Index” is related to Theil’s better known Entropy Index, which violates two of our axioms.
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Paper provided by Iowa State University, Department of Economics in its series Staff General Research Papers with number
12818.
Length: 40 pages Date of creation: 24 May 2007 Date of revision: Handle: RePEc:isu:genres:12818
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