Political Participation Of Immigrants Research Articles

Immigrant political participation is associated with more positive majority immigration attitudes across European countries and Swiss cantons

Immigrants are increasingly participating in politics, publicizing their political concerns and contributions. How does such political participation relate to national majorities’ immigration attitudes? Previous research suggested potential improvement of majority attitudes but also demonstrated the exacerbation of perceived threat. We investigated whether greater immigrant political participation is related to more positive or negative immigration attitudes among majority members. We implemented a cross-national and a cross-cantonal multilevel study drawing on the European Social Survey, the Second European Union Minorities and Discrimination Survey and the Swiss Migration-Mobility Survey with 43,632 participants in 26 European countries in Study 1 and with 1058 participants in 19 Swiss cantons in Study 2. Overall, higher levels of immigrant political participation were related to more positive attitudes. This association between participation and attitudes was stronger among left-wing than among right-wing nationals. Finally, we found no evidence that larger immigrant groups’ participation evoke threat and exacerbate attitudes. We conclude that immigrant political participation is associated with more positive majority attitudes.

Negotiating civic identity across different political contexts: Immigrant participation in social movements and political incorporation

AbstractThis article examines the understudied intersection between migration and contentious politics, focusing specifically on immigrant participation in social movements within their host societies. Drawing upon data from the Anti‐Extradition Law Amendment Bill (Anti‐ELAB) Movement in Hong Kong, it illuminates the process through which Chinese immigrants become politicized, evolve collective identities, and mobilize against civil dominance. Further, it underscores the transformative potential of social movements in facilitating immigrant political incorporation. However, it also recognizes the unilateral acceptance determined by mainstream society, which often leaves immigrants sidelined in discussions regarding their qualifications for unconventional political participation. To address civil inequality, immigrants establish their civil identities, challenge dominance, and amass political capital for future incorporation. This study extends the migration and social movements literature by shedding light on the political dynamics of immigrant participation and the hurdles they encounter during their journey toward political incorporation. It also underscores the significant role of progressive social movements in fostering immigrant political participation. Furthermore, the research highlights the unique immigrant political identity that emerges and evolves through participation in social movements, contesting exclusion and monopolistic dominance over democratic realization.

The imprint of autocracy on immigrant political participation: Reluctance to participate or to disclosure?

AbstractThe study investigates the relationship between premigration experiences with autocracy and immigrants' participation in politics in the host country. Using a survey of about 2000 immigrants in Quebec (Canada) interviewed over telephone or with an online questionnaire, it assesses two possible pathways regarding the effect of premigration with autocracy on participation in the host country politics. One pathway emphasizes a reluctance to participate where experiences with autocracy would hinder participation in the host country. The second pathway posits a reluctance to disclosure where experiences with autocracy leave immigrants with a lasting hesitation to reveal the extent of their participation. Our findings lend weak support for a reluctance to participate and instead suggest a reluctance to disclosure. These findings raise questions about our capacity to accurately portray the preferences and behaviours of immigrants, here those who experienced autocracy in the country of origin, and highlight the sensitivity of findings regarding immigrant integration to interview modes.

THE VOICE OF IMMIGRANTS FOR SOCIAL CHANGE: A SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGICAL VIEW ON THE POLITICAL PARTICIPATION OF IMMIGRANTS

Bu makalenin amacı, ev sahibi ülkelerdeki göçmenlerin politik katılımını (oy kullanma, kurumsallaşmış ve kurumsallaşmamış politik faaliyetler) konu alan ulusal ve uluslararası alandaki ampirik çalışmaları derlemektir. Göçmenlerin göç sonrası politik faaliyetleri hem ev sahibi ülkenin demokratik iklimi hem göçmenlerin entegrasyonu açısından son derece önemlidir. Bu nedenle göçmenlerin politik katılımının altında yatan sosyal psikolojik süreçlerin açıklanması büyük önem taşımaktadır. Bu çalışmada, göçmenlerin politik katılımındaki dinamik incelenmiş ve bu sürece grup düzeyinde ve bireysel düzeyde etki eden faktörler derlenmiştir. Grup düzeyi değişkenleri arasında sosyal adaletsizlik, etkililik algısı, sosyal kimlik ve gruplar arası temas gibi faktörlerin göçmenlerin politik katılımı üzerindeki etkilerine, bireysel farklılıklar arasında ise eğitim, cinsiyet, kuşak gibi bireysel özelliklere odaklanılmıştır. Son olarak, geçmiş çalışmaların sınırlılıkları tartışılmış ve gelecek çalışmalarda göz önünde bulundurulması gereken konulara dikkat çekilmiştir.

Socialization and Political Participation of Immigrants in South Korea

Socialization and Political Participation of Immigrants in South Korea

The participation paradox: demand for and fear of immigrant participation

ABSTRACT In this paper, we address the ambivalence in European immigrant integration discourses toward the political participation of immigrants. We show how this ambivalence manifests in what we call a ‘participation paradox’, which is constituted by two apparently conflicting, but potentially mutually reinforcing characteristics of the discourse. The first emphasizes the need for immigrants to be active in order to attain a well-integrated society and well-functioning democratic polity; the second is a call for the protection of liberal democratic institutions from the alleged ‘illiberal threats’ that migrants pose to society. Immigrant participation is thus both demanded and feared. Using illustrations from Denmark, we show two different ways in which this paradox plays out in practice: i) the fear of participation results in debates around the general desirability of immigrant participation; and ii) the perceived threat of ‘undesired participation’ reinforces the demand for immigrants to be ‘good’ citizens by participating in a ‘civic’ way. In these cases, the content of immigrant participation is discursively restricted. We end the paper by exploring the consequences of the paradox in terms of the democratic position of immigrants.

Democratic Civic Education for the Encouragement of Political Participation of Immigrants in Multicultural Societies

Democratic Civic Education for the Encouragement of Political Participation of Immigrants in Multicultural Societies

Voting here and there: political integration and transnational political engagement among immigrants in Europe

AbstractIn this article, I examine voting patterns in origin and receiving country national elections among immigrants in Europe. The existing scholarship on transnational political engagement offers two competing interpretations of the relationship between immigrant integration and transnational engagement, which I classify as the resocialization and complementarity perspectives. The resocialization perspective assumes that transnational political engagement gradually declines as immigrants become socialized into the new receiving society. Conversely, the complementarity perspective assumes that immigrant integration increases transnational political engagement. I test these competing perspectives with survey data collected between 2004 and 2008 for 12 different immigrant groups residing in seven European cities. The analysis examines how immigrant political and civic participation in receiving countries affect their proclivities to vote in homeland elections. I also analyse the effects of receiving and origin country contexts on immigrant voting behaviour in homeland elections. While my findings support both the resocialization and complementarity perspectives, they also highlight the ways in which a set of origin‐country contexts shape immigrant propensities to engage in transnational electoral politics. I observe a degree of complementarity among immigrants with resources who are motivated and eligible to participate in both receiving and origin‐country elections.

Immigrant Political Participation in Europe

This paper compares participation in different forms of political action between natives, immigrants and non-citizen immigrants using data from thirteen European countries across six waves of the European Social Survey. The authors highlight problems associated with previous categorizations of political action, and find that when political action is disaggregated and relative participation between groups is examined, that immigrants’ patterns of participation are not substantially different from those of natives. When comparing citizen immigrants to non-citizen immigrants, previous research has suggested that citizenship acts as a “ticket” to non-institutional, unconventional, confrontational forms of political action. The authors’ findings instead suggest a more complicated relationship between immigrant/citizenship status and preferences for political action since citizenship may facilitate participation in both so-called institutional and extra-institutional activities depending on the context of action.

Does Religious Attendance Increase Immigrant Political Participation?: A Case Study in Australia

AbstractThe relationship between religion and immigrant political participation has not been rigorously investigated in the literature set in Australia. In this study, I test whether religious attendance influences electoral and non-electoral participation among immigrants. Drawing on data from the 2013 Australian Election Study, I demonstrate that the impact of religious attendance on political participation may be overstated. I find that religious attendance is not significantly related to electoral and non-electoral participation among immigrants in Australia. This result may relate to three factors: the ability of religious attendance to affect immigrants’ key political resources; competition between religious and secular organizations; and the political salience of particular religious denominations within the Australian context. This study does not provide the much sought-after empirical confirmation to associational theories of political participation, but instead sounds a note of caution about the universal applicability of such theories.

Gender and Politics in Comparative Perspective: The Case of Ecuadorean Immigrants in Madrid and New York City

Building on scholarship on migration and gender in the United States, this article revisits previous findings on the intersection of gender, migration, and political engagement and extends the analysis to a city in a European context, Madrid. By comparing the political practices of first generation Ecuadorian men and women in New York City and Madrid, I demonstrate that contextual differences in these cities, such as immigration law and linguistic characteristics, produced different paths for immigrant political participation with respect to gender: a divergent one in New York City, and convergent one in Madrid.

Enjeux de la représentation et de la participation politique des émigrés dans leur pays d’origine : Vers une citoyenneté politique externe ?

Following years of disinterest or hostility, many sending states are now trying to create or strengthen linkages with citizens residing abroad. To this end, states are adopting new policies and creating new institutions dedicated to emigrants. In the past three decades, a majority of states worldwide has adopted external voting legislation that enables citizens abroad to vote (and in certain cases be represented) in the home country without having to return. In this article, I question the emergence of such policies and discuss their impact on immigrant political participation in their country of residence.

Electoral Participation of Immigrants: Why Do Immigrants Not Vote More Often When They are Given the Opportunity?

Objective: Examine why immigrants are less likely to vote. Methods: A new representative dataset on the political participation of immigrants in the 2015 municipal elections in the Canton of Geneva, Switzerland is presented. It draws on questions from the Swiss Electoral Studies (Selects) and is enriched with questions relevant to immigrant origin. Logistic regression analysis with predicted probabilities is used to predict electoral participation. Results: Despite having the right to vote, most immigrant groups are less likely to vote than the majority population. Four explanations are tested for this gap in political participation: differences in social origin, political engagement, civic integration and networks, as well as socialization. Individually, all these explanations are associated with differences in political participation, but when all are tested at once, socialization ceases to be statistically significant. Conclusion: While it cannot account for the entirety of differences, social origin accounts for a large part of the different probabilities to vote between nationalities.

Voting home or abroad? Comparing migrants' electoral participation in countries of origin and of residence

The political participation of immigrants has received increased scholarly attention over recent decades. However, comparisons between the electoral behavior of immigrants in their countries of origin and of residence are still limited. This article addresses this gap in the literature and seeks to identify the determinants of Romanian immigrants' electoral participation in the local elections of four West European countries (Germany, France, Italy, and Spain) as compared to their turnout in their home country's legislative elections. Looking through the lenses of exposure theory, we hypothesize that contact with institutions, people, and values from the countries of residence are likely to have different effects in the two types of elections. We test the explanatory power of four main variables - time spent in the host country, social networks, degree of involvement in the local community, and the type of relationship with citizens of their host countries - to which we add a series of individual-level controls such as age, education, gender, and media exposure. To assess our claim, we employ binary logistic regression to analyze original web survey data collected in the summer of 2013. The result supports the empirical implications of exposure theory.

The Political Participation of Immigrants

Political participation is an essential part of modern democracies. Where foreign citizens are enfranchised, it is frequently observed that immigrants and individuals of immigrant origin participate less than non-immigrants: a participation gap. This paper uses newly collected individual-level data to examine the correlates of the participation gap in the 2015 municipal elections in the Canton of Geneva. A representative sample of individuals eligible to vote in municipal elections is used, drawing on questions from the Swiss electoral study to examine political participation, enriched with questions relevant to immigrant origin. Four explanations are tested: differences in social origin, understanding of the political space, social integration and networks, as well as socialization. None of these explanations can account for the entirety of the participation gap and differences between (groups of) nationalities remain. Differences in predicted probabilities to vote are smallest in models that account for social origin and socialization respectively.

Sugar, Surveillance, and Citizenship: The Global Crisis of 1919–20 in Buenos Aires and New York

During the demobilization from the First World War in 1919, people around the world participated in mass protests over stagnant wages and the rising cost of living. With the Soviet revolution fresh in their minds, leaders used two strategies to contain dissent: xenophobic political repression on the one hand, and heavy-handed economic interventions to control the prices of basic foodstuffs on the other. In fact, the same law enforcement agency charged with repressing radicals, the US Justice Department, carried out sugar policies in 1919 and 1920. They created a cost of living bureau, which worked with New York sugar brokers to purchase cheap sugar on the world market. In the spring of 1920, they attempted to buy sugar in Argentina, which was neither a major sugar exporter nor one of the United States’ trading partners for sugar. This plan quickly ran into trouble, however, as protest in Argentina shaped politicians’ trade decisions. By the time the exports were approved, New York sugar prices had fallen and prices in Buenos Aires had skyrocketed. The resulting debates over sugar policy in both countries revealed how liberal democracies addressed political dissent through consumer markets. Policy-makers began to think of urban immigrants as political actors, ones who could either be incorporated through consumer populism or contained through police repression. And, in making calculations about how to control urban immigrant political participation, both Argentina and the United States implemented policies with lasting consequences for what people ate.

The Effects of Religious Attendance on Immigrant Political Participation in Australia

Although prior research suggests that religious attendance matters in the formation of citizens’ political life, few studies have examined the political significance of religious attendance for immigrants in Australia and how it influences immigrant political participation in Australia. This article analyzes the 2013 Australian Election Study Data using logit models. The analysis supports previous research which shows that religious attendance influences political participation among immigrants in different ways. However, the results are somewhat complex. The article also finds that religious faith is directly linked to political participation. It identifies a clear divide between those who have a religious faith and those who do not, and this divide influences political participation among immigrants. The findings suggest that religion has important implications for understanding immigrant political participation and for future research on religion and politics in Australia more broadly.

Does Social Capital Affect Immigrant Political Participation? Lessons from a Small-N Study of Migrant Political Participation in Rome

Social capital captures the idea that relationships hold value. While this idea has intuitive appeal, there is significant debate regarding its utility to political science research. This article employs original data collected in Rome, Italy, to test a new model that recognizes the distinction between levels of social capital and introduces the idea of conflict between these levels into the field’s current theorizing on immigrant political participation. The findings presented here lend further support for the proposed relationship between migration-related factors, such as language proficiency and length of stay and participation. The article’s main finding is that the interactions between group-level and individual-level social capital plays an important role in shaping participation. Specifically, because it reinforces group-level social capital, bonding social capital favors participation in the formal, institutionally sanctioned activity of voting, while bridging social capital—which mitigates the effect of group-level social capital—favors participation in the informal political activity, protest.

Mobilising abroad across ethnic lines: Home-country politics and immigrant political engagement in comparative perspective

Scholarship on immigrant political participation has recently examined how immigrants engage in collective action in the receiving society, whereas scholarship focussing on immigrant home-country politics has focused on debating immigrant political engagement vis-à-vis the origin society. What the literature has neglected is how immigrants engage simultaneously in immigrant and home–country politics. This article fills this lacuna through multi-sited fieldwork observations and interviews, showing how the Ecuadorian participants in this study engage in home-country politics in Madrid and New York City through grassroots organisations and why the leaders and members of these organisations reach out to non-ethnically based associations to make demands on the receiving society governments. The engagement of Ecuadorian political parties in the host societies heightens distrust among the participants in this study, inhibiting their organisation at the ethno-national level. As a result, participants find venues for engagement outside of their nationality group.

The Role of Nonprofit Sector Networks as Mechanisms for Immigrant Political Participation

Issues of immigrant political incorporation and transnational politics have drawn increased interest among migration scholars. This paper contributes to debates in this field by examining the role of networks, partnerships and collaborations of immigrant community organizations as mechanisms for immigrant political participation both locally and transnationally. These issues are addressed through an ethnographic study of the Hispanic Development Council, an umbrella advocacy organization representing settlement agencies serving Latin American immigrants in Toronto, Canada. Analysis of HDC’s three sets of networks (at the community, city and transnational levels) from a geographic and relational approach demonstrates the potentials and limits of nonprofit sector partnerships as mechanisms and concrete spaces for immigrant mobilization, empowerment, and social action in a context of neoliberal governance. It is argued that a combination of partnerships with a range of both state and non-state actors and at multiple scales can be significant in enabling nonprofit organizations to advance the interests of immigrant, minority and disadvantaged communities.