Diversity and inclusion are often spoken of interchangeably, but they mean different things and have different policy implications for cities to consider.

While racial diversity reflects how many residents are from different racial and ethnic backgrounds, racial inclusion, as we define it, is the extent to which residents of all races and ethnicities – particularly historically excluded groups – have the opportunity to benefit from and contribute to economic prosperity.

More diverse cities can be more inclusive, but the two don't always coincide. Even in diverse cities, power and prosperity may still be concentrated within one group. Overcoming the legacy of centuries of racist policies and practices requires city leaders to act intentionally.

So which cities are more aligned, and which diverge when it comes to diversity and inclusion? We at the Urban Institute ranked 274 of the most populous U.S. cities on racial inclusion using five measures: racial segregation; racial gaps in homeownership; racial gaps in education; racial gaps in poverty; and the share of the population who are people of color (in our analyses we define people of color as any person identifying in U.S. Census Bureau records as black or African American, American Indian and Alaska Native, Native Hawaiian and other Pacific Islander, other race, two or more races, or Hispanic or Latino white).

U.S. News & World Report applied a diversity index developed by USA Today that measures the likelihood that two randomly selected city residents are of different races or ethnicities. Comparing our data with the U.S. News diversity data for the 66 largest cities, we find frequent alignment, and occasional glaring divergence, between a city's racial diversity and racial inclusion.

Three of the 10 most diverse cities fall, as we might expect, within the most racially inclusive large cities. Five of the top 10, however, aren’t even in the top half of cities on racial inclusion.

This divergence tends to be driven by significant and persistent gaps in opportunity between white, non-Hispanic residents and residents of color. Oakland, California, for instance, which ranks No. 2 on the U.S. News diversity index but No. 26 on the Urban Institute’s racial inclusion index among large cities, had a homeownership gap of more than 20 percentage points, a racial poverty gap of nearly 15 percentage points, and a racial education gap of nearly 25 percentage points in 2013. (Note that on the Urban Institute profile page linked above we rank Oakland among a larger group of cities.)

Though it may seem counterintuitive at first, some of the least racially diverse cities actually fare well on our inclusion index due to more widely shared opportunity among residents of color. Of the 10 least diverse cities, only two fall within the least racially inclusive cities. In fact, the lowest-ranked city on the diversity index – El Paso, Texas – is ranked No. 4 on the racial inclusion index among large cities, and the second-lowest-ranked city on the diversity index – Detroit – is ranked No. 1. El Paso and Detroit are examples of a handful of cities with contrasting diversity and inclusion scores that have very few white, non-Hispanic residents. El Paso had a homeownership gap of only 2 percentage points (extremely low by national standards) and has made steady reductions in residential racial segregation since 1980. Detroit demonstrated substantially smaller racial gaps than other U.S. cities across homeownership (9 percentage points), poverty rate (2 percentage points), and education (1 percentage point).

Another case of diversity/inclusion divergence can occur when a city has a small share of residents of color, but these residents have relatively greater access to opportunity. For instance, in Dearborn, Michigan (a city of approximately 100,000 people that falls outside of the U.S. News analysis), the poverty rate for residents of color is actually 7 percentage points lower than for white non-Hispanic residents, and there is no gap in education by race.

Yet while a city may appear inclusive, small racial opportunity gaps do not always tell the full story. In some cases, they may indicate that the lowest-income people of color have been excluded or displaced from the city.

Diversity without inclusion cannot prevent powerlessness and the perpetuation of restricted opportunity. Inclusion without diversity can be difficult to sustain because it lacks the varied perspectives, experiences and representation often needed to enshrine shared prosperity. Community leaders must embrace racial diversity and racial inclusion as complementary objectives, keeping in mind that neither can guarantee the other.