DIFFERENT COUNTRIES, SIMILAR CHALLENGES?
A Comparative Assessment of Immigrant Political Participation in Western Europe
Sergiu Gherghina
Research Unit “Democratic Innovations”
Institute of Political Science
Goethe University Frankfurt
Paper prepared for presentation at the 3rd Research Conference
“Immigration, Incorporation, and Democracy”
Vienna, 14-15 November 2013
Abstract:
The existing research on immigrants’ political participation has paid little attention to cross-national comparisons between first-generation immigrants coming from one country. To fill this empirical void, this paper identifies the determinants of Romanian labor migrants’ political participation in France, Germany, Italy, and Spain. It argues and tests the effect of five main determinants related to individual orientations, attitudes, social interaction, and resources. Data comes from a web survey conducted in the summer of 2013. The empirical results show that, with small country-level variations, the political participation is a function of membership in organizations, a longer period of stay in the country of residence, and the size of immigrants’ social network. In addition, education and gender are good explanations for the engagement in politics.
Introduction
There is a general consensus in the literature that political participation is a fundamental component of democracy. It is both a right offered to the people and a practice that enhances the legitimacy and stability of the political system. In this context, over the last decades increased attention has been paid to the political involvement of those individuals who became new members of the polities in which they reside. Accordingly, the political participation of immigrants has been an intriguing topic approached from various angles. So far, previous research focused on the patterns of political participation (Cain et al., 1991; Jones-Correa, 1998; Hirschman et al., 1999; Bueker, 2005; de Rooij, 2012), its forms (Finifter and Finifter, 1989; Tam Cho, 1999; Garcia-Bedolla, 2000) or determinants (McAllister and Makkai, 1993; Arvizu and Garcia, 1996; Leal, 2002; Barreto and Munoz, 2003; Gerber et al., 2011; Ruedin, 2011). So far, most empirical analyses used a single-case study approach, compared immigrant groups within the same country, or investigated the behavior of different immigrant groups across several countries.
However, little attention has been paid, especially in Europe, to the cross-national political participation of first-generation immigrants belonging to the same group (i.e. coming from the same country). This paper fills this empirical void in the literature and compares the political participation of Romanian immigrants in four West European countries (France, Germany, Italy and Spain). The analysis focuses on several types of political participation (i.e. voting, campaign involvement, participation in protests or petition writing) and it is driven by the following question: what are the factors that enhance the immigrants’ political participation? The quest for an answer involves quantitative analysis at individual level. The ordered logistic regression tests for the explanatory power of five main independent variables: time spent in the host country, social network within the group of immigrants, associational behavior, perceived discrimination, and media consumption. The general and country-level models include controls for gender and education. The used dataset is original and consists of 1,358 respondents to a web survey conducted in June-August 2013.
The focus on labor migrants with major flows around the date of their countries’ accession to the EU (i.e. 2007) is not accidental. So far, most of the literature has focused on the political behavior of immigrants who live for a few decades in the country of residence or who have naturalized. At the same time, some findings reveal that migrants were often oriented towards achieving short-term economic goals and not very interested in political participation. By examining immigrant participation in the initial stages of residence, this paper makes two major scientific contributions: it sheds light on potential factors shaping the initial likelihood of participation and seeks to understand how the incorporation of immigrants into the politics of their country of residence takes place.
The rest of the paper is structured as follows. The following section reviews the literature on participation, conceptualizes the types of participation and briefly explains the approach used in this study. The second section discusses the potential determinants for the political participation of ethnic migrants and formulates several testable hypotheses. Next, the research design is presented with an emphasis on data, variable measurement, and methodology. The fourth section includes a detailed discussion of the bivariate and multivariate empirical findings. The conclusions summarize the key results, discuss the implications of this study and elaborate on avenues for further research.
Political participation and its determinants
The extensive attention dedicated to political participation in the literature is proportional to its conceptual complexity. The definitions of political participation have been gradually altered over time as a consequence of richer content and expanded meaning.
Defining and conceptualizing political participation
More than four decades ago Pateman (1970) argued that political participation occupied a minimal role in the theories of democracy. Until then, participation has been equivalent to electoral participation (i.e. voting), thus reflecting the concerns and long efforts for franchise enlargement, and the elitist theories with an emphasis on a limited role for citizens (Schumpeter, 1942; Sartori, 1962). According to the latter, citizens were expected to support or disagree with elites’ decisions and the only way to do this was through vote. The definition of political participation given by Verba and Nie (1972: 2) reflected this perspective: “Political participation refers to those activities by private citizens that are more or less directly aimed at influencing the selection of governmental personnel and/or the actions they take”. Accordingly, citizens had a voice only when they had to choose between representatives and support their policies. In their attempt to broaden the scope of political participation, Verba et al. (1978: 47) argue that while voting remains the primary way for citizens’ involvement in the political system, participation can also take place in-between elections “when citizens try to influence government decisions in relation to specific problems that concerns them”. Teorell et al. (2007) explain how both these definitions – although enlarging the elitist view of participation through the possibility to influence policies – continue to remain narrow as they refer exclusively to government policies.
This limitation became obvious in light of several empirical developments. An increasing amount of studies have shown that ordinary citizens have used various means to influence more types of political outcomes not only the state policies (Parry et al., 1992; Browning, 1996; Budge, 1996; Bimber, 1999; Fishkin et al. 2000). Following the diversification of participatory activities, a re-conceptualization of the notion appears necessary. Parry et al. (1992: 16) account for different outcomes and define political participation as ““action by citizens which is aimed at influencing decisions which are, in most cases, ultimately taken by public representatives and officials”. Brady (1999) takes one step further, broadens the spectrum of outcomes, and considers that political participation is “action by ordinary citizens directed toward influencing some political outcomes”. His perspective does no longer confine political participation to particular sets of citizen activities and outcomes. At the same time, participation is not oriented solely towards public officials and their decisions, but takes into account other institutions (e.g. interest groups that may influence policies. In their approach, Teorell et al. (2007: 336) strengthen the idea of any political outcomes, sometimes independent from government personnel or state agents.
This paper subscribes to these comprehensive definitions of political participation; accordingly, it also accounts for extensive types of participations. Verba et al. (1978) identified four general modes of political action: voting, campaign activities, contacting public officials, and cooperative or communal activities (with a focus on the issues in the local community). Teorell et al. (2007) and Dalton (2008: 34) added two new types: protests and other forms of contentious politics, and signing petitions[1]. Wider understandings of modes of participation include the new social movements or political violence (Urwin and Patterson, 1990; Parry et al. 1992; van Deth, 1997). This broad range of activities has led to a conceptual separation between the conventional and unconventional types of participation (Peterson, 1990). The conventional category includes the electoral participation and the actions associated with it: voting and electoral campaign activities. Unconventional participation refers to the rest of activities connected to contacting officials, protesting, and political violence. In spite of this useful division, earlier studies have shown that the boundaries of the different types are unclear neither from a conceptual (Richardson, 1993) nor from an empirical (Parry et al., 1992) point of view.
In light of such conceptual diversity, this study focuses on six types of political participation: voting (in local, national, and European elections), electoral campaign activities, protest activities, contacting politicians, petition signing, and political discussions[2]. At the same time, given the above mentioned overlaps, this study does not distinguish between conventional and unconventional forms of participation. It also treats the types as having equal weight and concurrent; thus, it does not follow the hierarchical conceptualization of Milbrath (1965).[3]
The focus on individuals
In addition to the dependent variable of this study, it is important to briefly explain the focus on the individual level (i.e. citizens’ motivations, opinions, and resources). The goal of this paper is to understand why immigrants belonging to a particular group (i.e. Romanians in four West European countries) engage in politics. Although carried in a specific setting and context, political participation has been always conceptualized as an individual activity. Consistent with this approach, the central argument of this paper is built primarily at individual and not at group level. Thus, it seeks to identify drivers for participation within the ethnic group and has no interest in investigating group-based issues such as ethnic claims or policies. Thus, comparisons are made within the group of Romanian immigrants – across several countries – and not with other groups of immigrants or citizens of the host countries.
The key premise of this approach is that individual beliefs, motivations, and resources influence the decision to participate. It builds on idea of political equality in the participation process from an individual perspective (Verba, 2003), leaving aside the inequalities that may emerge from differences between various groups.
This has been common for several decades in the research on participation. Milbrath and Goel (1977) illustrate that there are several instances in which individual traits are likely to affect behaviors. According to them, individual motivations gain priority when reference groups have conflicting points of view, when social roles are ambiguous and unknown, or when previous experience gets into conflict with current issues. The importance of individual resources and motivations – and the existing link between them – has been emphasized in several other studies (Rosenstone and Hansen, 1993; Verba et al., 1995; Dalton, 2008). To strengthen these findings, a significant body of literature indicates that individual subjective motivations foster political participation even in authoritarian regimes (Schulz and Adams, 1981; Bahry and Silver, 1990; Manion, 1996; Chen, 2000).
Why do immigrants engage in political participation?
Earlier research on political participation at micro level (i.e. individuals) has identified several explanations for why people engage in politics. There are no theoretical reasons to believe that the general mechanisms are not applicable to the specific group of immigrants; the latter get involved in politics just like other citizens of the country of residence and the determinants are likely to be similar. This section provides arguments for the explanatory power of five variables: length of stay, social network, associational behavior, perception of discrimination, and media consumption.
To begin with, social stability or social connectedness in the words of Leighley and Vedlitz (1999) can act as a catalyst for political participation. Individuals who live for a longer period of time in a community develop stronger social, economic or political interests. In turn, these interests are drivers for political participation. The Romanian labor migrants are the usual suspects to identify the existence of such a relationship. In their case, two additional mechanisms are at work. First, the time spent in the host country helps them to accustom to political systems that allow meaningful participation. All four West European countries provide their citizens with multiple democratic ways of expressing their (political) will. Romanian immigrants may theoretically know that political participation in the host country is possible, but they can become aware of their options for participation only gradually. Second, some of the Romanian migrants had participated in politics in their countries of origin before their departure. A longer period of stay in a new country can determine them to practice their old activities although the environment is different. Combining these three reasons there are reasons to expect that:
H1: Immigrants with a longer stay in the host country engage more in politics than the rest.
A large body of literature pointed in the direction of social networks as good predictors for political participation. The social connections with people similar to oneself and interactions expose individuals to varied and greater supplies of information. In turn, this information facilitates the understanding of politics and enhances the possibilities to get involved (Huckfeldt and Sprague, 1995; Huckfeldt, 2001). The core argument is that conversations between network partners facilitate the access of people to political information from the surrounding environment. When this information is of political nature, people are likely to become more active in politics. Within the network, people can gain access to different sets of politically-relevant information compared to that achieved on their own (Huckfeldt, 2001; Mutz, 2002; McClurg, 2003). Apart from the information nexus, the influence of social networks on political activity is exerted also through mobilization. There are a few instances in which political leaders use social contexts to mobilize mass participation (Rosenstone and Hansen 1993; Verba et al. 1995).
These mechanisms indicate that broader social networks are conducive to higher levels of political participation. The situation of immigrants matches this general perspective. In their case, the needs for information about their new social environment (i.e. host country) are quite high. The contact with peer immigrants with similar ethnic background – for the ease of communication – can foster a better understanding of how things work. Since political activities were often part of immigrants’ lives in their home country, the social networks also facilitate access to opportunities for participation during their stay in the host country. Broader social networks mean more experiences and more perspectives. Consequently, I expect a positive effect of the social network size on political participation.