Immigrants’ Political Integration in Anti- and Pro-Immigrant Contexts

Abstract

Millions of people have migrated to Europe during the last decades. As a result, the issue of immigrant integration in host societies has received increased attention among scholars and policymakers. The question of how to achieve successful political integration of the large new immigrant population is commonly addressed in the literature using individual-level predictors. In this dissertation, I argue for the need to also take into account the surrounding environment, focusing on how informal social and political contexts can hinder or foster immigrants' political integration. More specifically, this dissertation contributes to a nascent literature as it focuses on how anti- and pro-immigrant contexts influence immigrants' feelings of belonging, political trust and equal engagement to the political community. In the three individual research papers of the dissertation, I focus on different types of contexts and psychological and behavioural components of political integration. The findings underline the importance of equal treatment between immigrants and natives in host societies to achieve successful integration. In addition, I find the contextual effects to vary between contexts, and depending on immigrant generation and origin. These findings have substantial implications for our understanding of host societies' roles in immigrant integration.