Do Migrants Think Differently about Migration? An Experimentum Crucis for Explaining Attitudes on Migration

Abstract

The chapter discusses four theories to explain attitudes on immigration: economic group conflict theory, the cultural group conflict theory, the ingroup favoritism and the contact hypothesis. Attitudes held by migrants on immigration are highly illuminating as an empirical test for these theories. Migrants having entered the respective country previously are more economically threatened than the autochthon population, thus migrants would reject further immigration more than non-migrants. On the other hand, they are culturally less threatened which should result in attitudes more open to further immigration among migrants. Ingroup favoritism should result in more openness for immigration among migrants. The same applies for the contact hypothesis which implies a reduction of negative sentiments towards immigrant communities. Using the European Social Survey that covers attitudes towards immigration from European countries and non-European countries, testing countries of same race/ethnic origin and different race/ethnic origin, the findings are not fully coherent across European countries, however there is considerable evidence against the economic group conflict theory, while a decision between the other three theories is not possible.