Abstract
In debates about migration in Western countries, citizens’ concerns about immigrant groups often go hand in hand with concerns about the decline of society as a whole. Societal discontent, however, is a distinct concept and may have its own relations with immigration attitudes, over and above the role of perceived immigrant threat. In a survey of a representative sample of Dutch people (N = 1239), we disentangled societal discontent from intergroup threat with respect to their relationship with different kinds of action intentions regarding refugees (both pro and anti) and intentions regarding the government. Unsurprisingly, societal discontent predicted support for anti-government protest (which was strikingly high). More importantly, societal discontent independently predicted both pro-refugee and anti-refugee action intentions, over and above intergroup threat. These associations were moderated by intergroup threat: only when refugees were experienced as a threat did discontent predict anti-refugee action intentions. On the other hand, societal discontent predicted more pro-refugee action intentions, but only when people experienced refugees as an enrichment. Thus, despite populist rhetoric, societal discontent is not always tied to anti-immigrant actions. This suggests that refugee sentiments and societal discontent are not exchangeable: societal discontent plays an important role in reactions to immigration.
Highlights
In debates about migration in Western countries, citizens’ concerns about immigrant groups often go hand in hand with concerns about the decline of society as a whole
Previous research on societal discontent has shown that measures of specific manifestations of societal discontent, such as low political trust, pessimism and unease about the direction that the country is heading (Steenvoorden, 2015), overestimating the prevalence of societal issues, believing that society is in decline (Elchardus & Spruyt, 2016) and considering leadership to be breaking down and social fabric to be eroding (Teymoori et al, 2016), are highly correlated with each other (Elchardus & Spruyt, 2016; Steenvoorden, 2015; Teymoori et al, 2016; van der Bles et al, 2015), suggesting that they are all affected by an underlying general discontent with society at large
When discontent with society predicts pro- or anti-refugee action So far, using intergroup threat theory and theory on societal discontent, we have argued that people who feel societal discontent are most likely to have action intentions and that discontent with society may predict either more pro- or more anti-refugee action intentions, depending on how one feels about refugees
Summary
In debates about migration in Western countries, citizens’ concerns about immigrant groups often go hand in hand with concerns about the decline of society as a whole. Previous research on societal discontent has shown that measures of specific manifestations of societal discontent, such as low political trust (van der Meer & Hakhverdian, 2016), pessimism and unease about the direction that the country is heading (Steenvoorden, 2015), overestimating the prevalence of societal issues (van der Bles et al, 2015), believing that society is in decline (Elchardus & Spruyt, 2016) and considering leadership to be breaking down and social fabric to be eroding (Teymoori et al, 2016), are highly correlated with each other (Elchardus & Spruyt, 2016; Steenvoorden, 2015; Teymoori et al, 2016; van der Bles et al, 2015), suggesting that they are all affected by an underlying general discontent with society at large. This societal discontent does not typically originate in discontent with personal circumstances, but rather it originates in discontent with the societal collective (Elchardus & De Keere, 2013; Elchardus & Spruyt, 2016; van der Bles et al, 2015)
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