High Levels Of Immigration Research Articles

From the Fringe to the front-stage. European immigration and the Far-Right vote: An IV approach

We use regional data spanning over 4500 electoral outcomes at NUTS3 level between 2000 and 2017 to assess the impact of immigration on Western European Far-Right voting. To deal with potential reverse causation, we use immigration in neighboring countries as an instrument for domestic immigration. The estimated effects of immigration are positive, significant and larger compared to those obtained by simple OLS and fixed effects regressions. Depending on the measure of immigration used, we find that a 1% increase in immigration stocks leads to a between 1.78% and 2.97% in Far-Right voting. Similar results are obtained using electoral outcomes and immigration shares at the NUTS2 level, where the effect of immigration is estimated between 3% and 5.32%. Our results are consistent with possible negative feedback from the Far-Right to immigration. Our estimated effects explain a large part of the observed rise in Far-Right in Western European countries that experienced high levels of immigration during the span of our sample.

The political effects of intra-EU migration: Evidence from national and European elections in seven countries

This article studies the impact of immigration from Central and Eastern Europe on support for Eurosceptic parties. The analysis covers 30 national and European Parliament elections in seven Western, Northern and Southern European countries (2004 to 2019). For each election, I analyse how the local-level share of the vote for right- and left-wing Eurosceptic parties varies as a function of the levels and changes in the local-level share of Central and Eastern European immigrants from the population, controlling for the influence of relevant demographic, social and economic variables. I find that higher levels of immigration from Central and Eastern Europe are systematically related to higher voting shares cast for right-wing Eurosceptic parties at the local level in all of these countries, net of the influence of non-Western immigration, in elections for the European Parliament and in national elections as well. The effects on left-wing Euroscepticism are heterogeneous: positive in the Netherlands, Austria and Portugal, but negative in Italy, Denmark and Sweden. The effects have not diminished significantly over the past 15 years and are most visible in mid-sized localities.

Neighborhood Trust, Cohesion, and Diversity: How Demographic Patterns and Processes Shape Their Relationships

AbstractCompelling evidence from around the world suggests that ethnic diversity is detrimental to neighborhood trust and cohesion. Much of this evidence derives from empirical associations found with static indicators of diversity, measuring the mix of ethnic groups at a single point in time, and controlling for a varied mix of individual and community‐level covariates. Less attention though has sought to understand how dynamic processes of migration and residential settlement both create diversity and influence trust and cohesion. In this study, census and survey data are used to analyze the demographic and economic characteristics and dynamics coinciding with diversity in local communities in Australia, and the implications for neighborhood trust and cohesion. Diverse communities are heavily concentrated in moderately and highly disadvantaged communities in large immigrant gateway cities. Highly diverse communities experience continual high levels of immigration and population turnover and contain young age structures and more diverse and transient housing and household structures. Survey analyses reveal that these characteristics substantially explain observed negative associations between diversity and neighborhood trust and cohesion. The results point to the near‐intractable difficulties in isolating the effects of diversity and the importance of understanding the dynamic demographic processes in the construction of neighborhood diversity, trust, and cohesion.

Predictor Role of Parental Neglect On Socio-Emotional And Moral Development And Behavioral Problems In Children

The purpose of the present study was to examine parental neglect as a predictor of socio-emotional and moral development and behavioral problems in children. The participants of the study consisted of 266 parent-child dyads in Hatay, Turkey. The data collection instruments included a Socio-Demographic Information Form, which was administered to both the parents and their children. In addition, children were administered the Social-Emotional and Moral Development Scale, whereas the parents were administered the Child Behavior Checklist and Multidimensional Neglectful Behaviors Scale. According to the stepwise regression analysis, it was found that the number of children the parents had, behavioral problems in children, nationality and duration of stay of Syrian parents in Turkey, and parental neglect predicted socio-emotional and moral development in children. In terms of behavioral problems in children, parents’ age, educational status, and neglectful behaviors, in addition to children’s socio-emotional and moral development, were found to be the significant predictors. The results of the study may shed light on the associations among parental neglect and the socio-emotional and moral development and behavioral problems in children for school authorities and mental health professionals in a cosmopolitan population with high levels of immigration.

Movilidad, migración y empleo en Europa

Three aspects of European societies are analysed in this article: the very low level of labour mobility within European Union (EU) Member States (MS), the high level of external immigration, and the disparate and sometimes extremely high rates of unemployment, especially in MS with an extremely low level of mobility and high levels of immigration. Intra-EU mobility is six times lower than in the US, and is mainly from Eastern MS. Non-EU immigration is higher than in the US, coming from the Southern Mediterranean, Latin America, the Middle East, Asia, and Africa, and is concentrated in the North Mediterranean EU MS. It is precisely the MS of this area of the euro zone that are receiving workers from several foreign countries, as well as from the EU, and this area has low employment rates, and high or very high unemployment rates.

Extreme climate and crime: Empirical evidence based on 129 prefecture-level cities in China

Climate change is having profound effects on natural and socio-economic systems, especially via extreme climate events. Using panel data from 129 prefectural-level cities in China from 2013 to 2019, this paper explores the effects of extreme climate on crime rates based on a climate index and manual collection of crime data. The results showed that extreme climate has a significant positive effect on crime rates, increasing by 0.035% for every 1% increase in the extreme climate index. This occurs through two mechanistic pathways: reduced agricultural output and lower employment income. The heterogeneity analysis shows that extreme climate has a greater impact on crime rates in eastern areas which are economically developed and have high levels of immigration. This study provides new perspectives on the impact of extreme climate on the economy and society, in which governments can actively participate in climate governance through environmental protection, energy conservation and emission reduction, and technological innovation to reduce crime rates by reducing the occurrence of extreme climate.

The Deportation Machine: America's Long History of Expelling ImmigrantsOne Mighty and Irresistible Tide: The Epic Struggle over American Immigration, 1924–1965

The Deportation Machine: America's Long History of Expelling ImmigrantsOne Mighty and Irresistible Tide: The Epic Struggle over American Immigration, 1924–1965

Does Immigration Produce a Public Backlash or Public Acceptance? Time-Series, Cross-Sectional Evidence from Thirty European Democracies

After decades of relatively high inflows of foreign nationals, immigration is now at the center of substantial political divisions in most European countries and has been implicated in one of the most vexing developments in European politics, the rise of the xenophobic right. However, it is not clear whether high levels of immigration actually do cause a public backlash, or whether publics become habituated to, and supportive of, immigration. This study tests these backlash and habituation theories using novel measures of immigration mood and immigration concern produced by combining over 4,000 opinion datapoints across twenty-nine years and thirty countries. The authors find evidence of a public backlash in the short to medium run, where mood turns negative and concern about immigration rises. Yet the study also finds evidence of a longer-run process of habituation that cancels out the backlash effect within one (concern) to three (mood) decades.

Coincident Patterns of Suicide Risk Among Adult Patients with a Primary Solid Tumor: A Large-Scale Population Study.

BackgroundSuicide rate is much higher in cancer patients than in general population. This study examined the suicide risk in survivors of primary solid tumor across 19 cancer sites considering risk coincident patterns based on area-based SES indicators.MethodsA retrospective search of the SEER database was conducted. Independent risk factors for suicide were identified using the Cox proportional-hazards model. Exploratory factor analysis and cluster analysis were used to create coincident patterns of SES factors.ResultsSuicide risk was higher for patients with a primary solid tumor who were older, male, white, unmarried, had no insurance, poorly differentiated, distant metastasis and did not undergo active treatment (especially surgery). The suicide risk was higher for patients living in areas with economic and education disadvantage, high levels of immigration and crowding, and high levels of residential instability. Concomitant presence of high economic and education disadvantage, high immigration and crowding levels and low residential instability, showed the highest risk of suicide.ConclusionIn order to mitigate suicidal risk, clinicians should pay more attention to patients who are older, male, white, not married, high levels of cancer severity, not received active treatment (especially surgery), and having no insurance. Identifying coincident patterns of suicide help further screen high suicidal risk patients based on area-based socioeconomic status.

Residential Context and Voting for the Far Right: The Impact of Immigration and Unemployment on the 2017 French Presidential Election

The assumption that increasing diversity and economic hardship boost support for the far right is widespread, yet extant research comes up with contradictory findings. This article investigates the link between context and the far right by investigating the impact of immigration and unemployment on voting for Marine Le Pen in the first round of the 2017 French Presidential election. We match a large individual-level survey with contextual variables constructed from the census describing voters’ residential environments. Unlike previous studies, we measure immigration and unemployment at the neighborhood level and the broader level of the department. Using a multilevel model, we find that voters in neighborhoods with high levels of immigration are less likely to vote for the far right. However, in departments, increased immigration and unemployment correlate with greater support for Le Pen. These findings suggest that contact theory and ethnic threat operate differently according to spatial scale.

Conservar la arquitectura vernácula en Andorra

Andorra es un pequeño país enclavado en los Pirineos que ha experimentado una transformación radical en el último medio siglo. De una cultura centenaria de montaña basada en una economía agropecuaria de subsistencia ha pasado a convertirse, de la noche a la mañana, en un centro turístico de primer orden con una fuerte inmigración. Aquella sociedad tradicional que partía de la casa familiar como centro de la vida social quedó arrinconado y, con ella, muchos de sus testimonios materiales. En los últimos años se ha vuelto la mirada al pasado para conectar a las nuevas generaciones con su propia historia. Para ello se está llevando a cabo una política de recuperación del legado tradicional en la que se incentiva la rehabilitación de la arquitectura vernácula. En este sentido ha sido fundamental la promulgación, en 2003, de la Ley del Patrimonio Cultural. Las intervenciones recientes han permitido conocer mejor la construcción tradicional andorrana, sus problemas de conservación y la bondad de las soluciones adoptadas. En este artículo se pone el foco de atención en la historia de este legado y en la forma en que se está rehabilitando.

Making the government accountable: rethinking immigration as an issue in the European Union

ABSTRACT In the last decades, European countries have experienced two relevant waves of immigration. These ‘immigration shocks’ have contributed to increase dramatically public attention on immigration issues but also to structure political competition on both the supply and the demand side of democratic representation. While immigration issue has been traditionally conceived as a positional issue, the consensus among voters and the policy convergence of mainstream parties seem to resemble Stokes’ model and competition is on a valence issue instead of position issue. Therefore, the present paper analyses whether and to what extent voters punish incumbents for high levels of immigration. Using data from the European Election Study, the analysis confirms that while voters perceiving high levels of immigration punish incumbents, performance voting depends on individual-level attributes such as partisanship and salience, but also country-level factors like the government clarity of responsibility. Finally, immigration performance voting is not moderated by issue ownership. However, the perceived competence of parties to manage immigration reveals a direct and independent effect on incumbent vote intention.

Acceptable in the EU? Why some immigration restrictionists support European Union mobility

Why do some Europeans support immigration from within the European Union, while rejecting immigration from elsewhere? Acceptance of intra-European Union mobility—even by those who wish to restrict immigration more generally—is important for popular support for the European Union itself. This paper identifies and attempts to explain the preferences of “EU-only inclusionists”: EU nationals who support relatively high levels of immigration, but only from within the European Union. We analyze an underexplored experimental module in the European Social Survey to explore European Union inclusionism in relation to other preference profiles. We find that identification with the European Union helps explain specific support for European Union mobility, while subnational (racial and religious) identities are associated with a preference for European migrants over non-Europeans, but not with specific support for intra-European Union movement.

Extra‐pair offspring are less heterozygous than within‐pair offspring in American redstarts Setophaga ruticilla

The vast majority of bird species are socially monogamous; however, extra‐pair paternity is nearly ubiquitous and a number of theories have been proposed to explain the prevalence of this mixed mating strategy. Here, we test the genetic compatibility hypothesis – the idea that females seek extra‐pair copulations with males whose genes are more compatible with her own. For this study, we examined eight years of paternity data (2004–2011) from a Nearctic‐Neotropical migratory bird, the American redstart Setophaga ruticilla, breeding in southeastern Ontario, Canada. We predicted that females paired with genetically similar males (higher relatedness) would be more likely to produce extra‐pair offspring and that extra‐pair offspring would have higher levels of heterozygosity than within‐pair offspring. Alternatively, because this population experiences high levels of immigration, females may produce extra‐pair offspring with more genetically similar males because of the potential for outbreeding depression. Using five highly variable microsatellite markers, we examined patterns of relatedness among social pairs as well as measures of offspring heterozygosity. In contrast to our predictions, we found no difference in relatedness between social pairs where the females produced extra‐pair offspring and social pairs where the females produced only within‐pair offspring. However, extra‐pair offspring were significantly less heterozygous than within‐pair offspring. Together, these findings suggest that females a) are not engaging in extra‐pair fertilizations based on relatedness to their social mate and b) appear to be mating with extra‐pair males that are more genetically similar to themselves. We suggest there may be benefits for females to mate with genetically similar extra‐pair males in highly outbred populations with high rates of immigration, such as for maintaining co‐adapted gene complexes or genes coding for local adaptations.

Extinction vortex dynamics of top predators isolated by urbanization.

Extinction risk is elevated in small, isolated populations due to demographic and genetic interactions. Therefore, it is critical to model these processes realistically in population viability analyses (PVA) to inform local management and contribute to a greater understanding of mechanisms within the extinction vortex. We conducted PVA's for two small mountain lion populations isolated by urbanization in southern California to predict population growth, extinction probability, and loss of genetic diversity with empirical data. Specifically, we (1) provide the first PVA for isolated mountain lions in the Santa Ana Mountains (SAM) that considers both demographic and genetic risk factors and (2) test the hypothesis that variation in abundance and mortality between the SAM and Santa Monica Mountains (SMM) result in differences in population growth, loss of heterozygosity, and extinction probability. Our models predicted 16-21% probability of local extinction in the SAM due purely to demographic processes over 50yr with current low levels or no immigration. Our models also predicted that genetic diversity will further erode in the SAM such that concern regarding inbreeding depression is warranted unless gene flow is increased, and that if inbreeding depression occurs, rapid local extinction will be highly likely. Dynamics of the two populations were broadly similar, but they also exhibited differences driven by larger population size and higher mortality in the SAM. Density-independent scenarios predicted a rapidly increasing population in the SMM, whereas growth potential did not differ from a stable trend in the SAM. Demographic extinction probability and loss of heterozygosity were greater in the SMM for density-dependent scenarios without immigration. However, higher levels of immigration had stronger, positive influences on both demographic viability and retention of genetic diversity in the SMM driven by lower abundance and higher adult survival. Our results elucidate demographic and genetic threats to small populations within the extinction vortex, and how these vary relative to demographic structure. Importantly, simulating seemingly attainable increases in connectivity was sufficient to greatly reduce extinction probability. Our work highlights that conservation of large carnivores is achievable within urbanized landscapes, but requires land protection, connectivity, and strategies to promote coexistence with humans.

Critical LPP and the intersection of class, race and language policy and practice in twenty first century Catalonia

Language policy and planning (LPP) has always drawn on research and scholarship in education as well as the social sciences in general (in particular sociology). Social theory has also figured as an important source of ideas and concepts, and critical LPP has arisen as a distinct strand of inquiry since the 1980s (Tollefson, in Planning language, planning inequality: language policy in the community. Longman, London, 1991; Tollefson (ed) Language policies in education: critical issues. Routledge, London, 2013). More recently, critical LPP researchers have begun to turn to political economy, as a source discipline, and neoliberalism, as a baseline concept, in the study of LPP-related phenomena and practices in a range of contexts (Ricento 2015; Tollefson & Perez-Milans 2018). This paper examines how a critical political economy-oriented approach may be applied in a specific context, that of Catalonia, where most would agree that there has been a relatively successful recovery of a minority language situated in a larger nation-state structure traditionally dominated by a monolingual (Spanish) polity. This critical approach explores, on the one hand, how political economy—which examines the power relations that mutually constitute the production, distribution, and consumption of resources and the class relations that emerge within these processes—may be brought to bear on issues arising in the ongoing development of LPP in Catalonia. In addition, this critical approach is attentive to issues around race and ethnicity which inevitably arise in societies experiencing high levels of immigration, as has been the case in Catalonia over the past 25 years. This paper aims to bring these two strands together, examining how two key matters of interest in political economy today– inequality and class—intersect with race and ethnicity in the ongoing development of language policy in Catalonia, focussing specifically on the Barcelona metropolitan area. And further to this, it aims to understand how this intersectionality is, at the same time, intersected by the nexus of a Catalan national, cultural and linguistic identity emerging from the aforementioned relatively successful recovery of Catalan over the past several decades.

How Does Immigration Affect Suicide? An Analysis of U.S. Metropolitan Areas*

AbstractObjectiveLimited research investigates the relationship between levels of immigration, a source of societal integration and regulation, and U.S. suicide rates. We examine the aggregate immigration–suicide link during the 2008–2010 period, in light of the 30‐year high in suicide rates and concern about deleterious effects of immigration on the well‐being of American society.MethodsWe use data on 250 U.S. metropolitan areas and ordinary least squares regression to examine the association between immigration and suicide for 2008–2010.ResultsNet of controls, recent immigration, is linked to lower suicide levels for the native‐born population but has no association with foreign‐born suicide rates. High levels of immigration are most protective for native‐born suicide under favorable economic conditions.ConclusionsImmigration is not a threat to societal health in terms of higher suicide rates. Future research should consider the mechanisms through which beneficial effects of immigration on suicide rates operate.

Mapping the European far right in the 21st century: A meso-level analysis

Using a new regional database of national and European parliament elections on NUTS 2 level in 28 countries, we test the main theories explaining the electoral support for the European far right. Accounting for differences between the extremist (ER) and populist radical right (PRR), we find evidence in support of both economic insecurity and cultural backlash theses. The ER vote is associated mostly with economic insecurity and the PRR vote mostly with cultural backlash. Whereas micro and macro-level analyses have often produced conflicting results, unemployment, immigration and income inequalities have significant and robust effects at the meso level, indicating that the factors determining the far right vote might at large be operating at a sub-national level. In line with the “contact” and “salience-of-change” hypotheses, the effects of economic insecurity are more pronounced in regions that undergo sudden changes compared to those with high levels of immigration.

How Immigration Grease Is Affected by Economic, Institutional, and Policy Contexts: Evidence from EU Labor Markets

SummaryTheoretical arguments and previous country‐level evidence indicate that immigrants are more fluid than natives in responding to changing skill shortages across countries, occupation groups and industries. The diversity across EU member states enables us to test this hypothesis across various institutional, economic and policy contexts. Drawing on the EU LFS and EU SILC datasets, we study the relationship between residual wage premia as a measure of skill shortages in different occupation‐industry‐country cells and the shares of immigrants and natives working in these cells. We find that immigrants’ responsiveness to skill shortages exceeds that of natives in the EU15, in particular in member states with low GDP, higher levels of immigration from outside EU, and more open immigration and integration policies; but also those with barriers to citizenship acquisition or family reunification. While higher welfare spending seems to exert a lock‐in effect, a comparison across different types of welfare states indicates that institutional complementarities alleviate such effect.

Immigration, race, mortgage lending, and the geography of debt in Canada’s global cities

While scholars typically analyze debt relations as social relations, often at the national or global level with respect to international flows of global capital and interest payments, there has been less attention on how international mobility and immigration are constitutive of geographies of debt. An urbanized nation with a reputation for welcoming high levels of immigration, as well as for escaping the worst of the global financial crisis with no banking crisis, Canada has also received international attention for high housing prices and high levels of household debt, particularly in its global cities. What has not yet received sufficient attention are the potential effects of federal government policies and programs in encouraging new immigrants to take out disproportionately large mortgages to access owner-occupied housing, nor the implications of such programs and migrant flows for understanding geographies of debt. Justified by proponents of asset-based welfare, homeownership is purported to be crucial for immigrant integration and economic mobility, and yet, literature linking the socio-spatial dynamics of immigrant debt to asset-based welfare policies and the creation of citizen subjectivities remains scarce. This paper investigates questions related to these issues in Canada's three global cities, Toronto, Montreal and Vancouver, using data aggregated at the neighbourhood scale. The results point to an interaction effect between federal policies encouraging homeownership, metropolitan housing costs, and neighbourhood immigrant debt levels. Not only do immigrants bear significantly higher debt burdens than do native-born Canadians, but many neighbourhoods with a high concentration of immigrants, particularly in the metropolitan areas with the tightest housing markets, have significantly higher levels of mortgage debt than other neighbourhoods. Such geographies of debt, we suggest, have implications not only for intra-urban spatial distributions of debt and wealth, but also for understanding how the spatiality of debt interacts with federal policies and national financial vulnerabilities and resiliences, pointing to the importance of immigration flows and policies in helping produce and maintain financial flows and financial power.