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At the metropolitan level, tolerance is the outcome of diverse populations ‘rubbing shoulders.’ Urban areas have long been associated with both political and social tolerance. People from major urban regions are more willing to grant civil rights and other politically tolerant laws. They also tend to have a higher moral approval rating of groups that are perceived by mainstream society as being deviant. The more of these groups jammed into an urban area, the higher the probability that its residents will interact or rub shoulders with people different from themselves. Yet, when research delves below the metropolitan level to the neighborhood level, tolerance has a different relationship with diversity.

Florida believes cool diverse scenes with concentrated minority groups indicate tolerance. Demographic, sociological and economic scholarship argues that concentrated minorities reflect intolerance. Mainstream policies and practices such as racism ‘forced’ minority concentration overtime in a path dependent process. If groups are concentrated, then how do they interact or rub shoulders? What accounts for these confounding themes? In chapter two, I examined how political and social tolerance manifested for gays and lesbians in Austin, Tx. In the 1970s and 1980s, the gay and lesbian community was concentrated downtown and near the University of Texas. The concentration of key organizations and businesses led to networking and strategizing. This ultimately brought about political and then social tolerance in Austin over the past four decades. To explain this process, I turn to social movement theory.