Ethnic-Residential Anchoring: A Sociological Theory of Communitarian Settlement in Cameroonian Cities

This article developed an exploratory sociological theory of residential choice in sub-Saharan African cities, using observations from the Cameroonian context. It examined the limits of strictly economic and land-market explanations of urban settlement and formulated the theory of ethnic-residential anchoring. The analysis drew on urban sociology and African urban anthropology and conceptualized residential location as a social act shaped by ethnic solidarities, cultural representations of space, and the search for collective security. The article defined the theory's key concepts, identified five secondary postulates, and specified a cumulative explanatory mechanism linking ethnic affinity, communitarian residential preferences, community networks, residential security, spatial concentration, and the reproduction of ethnic neighborhoods. A conceptual model was developed to connect micro-sociological residential trajectories with macro-sociological spatial configurations. The discussion distinguished this framework from classical urban ecology and residential segregation approaches while acknowledging its exploratory status. The article concluded that comparative empirical research in Cameroonian cities was required to assess the relative weight of community-based mechanisms alongside economic, institutional, religious, and social factors.