Expanding the Electorate: Comparing the Noncitizen Voting Practices of 25 Democracies

Abstract

Historically, citizenship has been the sine qua non for the franchise. Yet in the last several decades, dozens of democracies have created some form of voting rights for resident aliens. Noncitizen voting rights are conceptually important because they suggest some democracies have fundamentally redefined the body politic. What explains the emergence of the noncitizen franchise? Why do some democracies limit these rights to municipal elections while others allow resident aliens to vote in parliamentary elections? To answer these questions, this study tests two competing theses: the national process thesis that emphasizes domestic institutional constraints and political contestation, and the liberal convergence thesis that emphasizes international and transnational factors that shape states’ citizenship regimes. The study uses a time-series cross-section research design to explain both variations in the content of noncitizen voting rights and the timing of these policy changes. The study finds that although international factors may explain the timing of enfranchisement of noncitizens, domestic factors explain why the content of these rights vary considerably from state to state.