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This article seeks to denaturalize the ‘Rust-Belt’, through a micro, transnational and comparative analysis of the evolution of two cities, Cleveland (Ohio) and Bradford in England. Whereas Cleveland epitomizes the Rust-Belt for many Americans, Bradford is a former capital of the textile industry in England (wool). The focus of this article is on the extent to which ethno-racial dynamics have impacted on the evolution of the two cities, notably white flight in Cleveland and Pakistani immigration in Bradford. The ‘Rust-Belt’ is apprehended here as a primarily reputational phrase, fuelling as it does stigmatizing, outside discourses on a locale. This is particularly so in the case of Cleveland and Bradford, which have been to their detriment associated with topical issues such as environmental ones (pollution of river Cuyahoga and Lake Erie) and Islam and integration of Muslims (the Satanic Verses affair in Bradford).