Abstract
ABSTRACTNegativity towards ethnic minorities is a serious problem in Northern Ireland. Its history of the Troubles around religious identities makes Northern Ireland a special case in Europe. This paper examines negativity towards Muslims, Eastern Europeans and immigrants in Northern Ireland using data from the Northern Ireland Life and Times Survey and the British Social Attitudes Survey. The results from regressions show that anti-immigrant negativity is no more prevalent in Northern Ireland than elsewhere in the UK. However, levels of negativity towards Muslims and Eastern Europeans are significantly higher than in Great Britain and have increased in recent years, particularly among young adults aged 18–24 years, although older cohorts are more intolerant on average. Our regression analyses found strong positive relationships between anti-immigrant negativity, sectarianism and perceived neighbourhood segregation. Higher education, contacts with minority members and (religiously) mixed schooling are negatively related to negativity towards immigrants.
Highlights
Negativity towards immigrants and ethnic minorities is known to be a problem in Northern Ireland
Our first research question was whether negative attitudes towards immigrants and ethnic minorities are more prevalent in Northern Ireland than in other regions of the UK, justifying to label the region the “race hate capital of the UK” (Lentin and McVeigh 2006; McVeigh and Rolston 2007; Knox 2011)
We carried out a UK-wide comparison of negative population attitudes towards immigrants, Muslims and Eastern Europeans using the Northern Ireland Life and Times Surveys (NILT) and British Social Attitudes Survey (BSA) data
Summary
Negativity towards immigrants and ethnic minorities is known to be a problem in Northern Ireland. Much of the literature has linked Northern Ireland’s high rates of racially motivated hate crimes and the strong prevalence of negative attitudes towards ethnic minorities to the region’s sectarian past (Moore 1972; McVeigh and Rolston 2007; Knox 2011; Savaric 2014; McKee 2015; McVeigh 2015) This view has been the predominant public discourse, e.g. the former pastor John McCreedy was recently cited in the press calling racism “the new sectarianism” (Irish News 2016)
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