IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/joimai/v16y2015i1d10.1007_s12134-014-0332-x.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Voting Participation of Immigrants in Sweden—a Cohort Analysis of the 2002, 2006 and 2010 Elections

Author

Listed:
  • Pieter Bevelander

    (Malmö University)

Abstract

Three decades ago, Sweden extended municipal and provincial voting privileges to non-citizen residents on the grounds that this would increase political influence, interest and self-esteem among this group of immigrants. Three decades later, in the political and public debate, electoral participation on the part of immigrants is perceived as being substantially lower than for native-born citizens. As a result, questions have arisen regarding the degree to which this may be symptomatic of a larger integration issue. The aim of this paper is to explore the determinants of voting in municipal elections for immigrants—both naturalised and non-citizens, in Sweden, by controlling for a number of socio-economic and demographic and immigrant specific characteristics. More specifically, using cohort analysis, the idea is to study the impact of time spent in the country on the voting behaviour of immigrants, foreign citizens and naturalised over time. Two unique sets of data were used in the research. The 2002, 2006 and 2010 electoral surveys (participation study) all contain information about individual electoral participation in municipal elections. This information is matched to registry data from Statistics Sweden, which also contains information relating to every Swedish resident. From these two sources of information, a database is created that matches voting to individual characteristics. This study analyses 60 thousand immigrants of which 43 thousand are non-citizens. After controlling for demographic and socioeconomic characteristics, the results show that the acquisition of citizenship makes a real difference in the voting odds. Immigrants who obtain citizenship are far more likely to vote than those who do not. Country of birth also makes a difference: Compared to immigrants from the Nordic countries, Europeans and North American immigrants are equal or less likely to vote, whereas immigrants from Asia, Africa and Latin America are more likely to vote. Finally, immigrants’ odds of voting increase as their length of stay in the country does.

Suggested Citation

  • Pieter Bevelander, 2015. "Voting Participation of Immigrants in Sweden—a Cohort Analysis of the 2002, 2006 and 2010 Elections," Journal of International Migration and Integration, Springer, vol. 16(1), pages 61-80, February.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:joimai:v:16:y:2015:i:1:d:10.1007_s12134-014-0332-x
    DOI: 10.1007/s12134-014-0332-x
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1007/s12134-014-0332-x
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1007/s12134-014-0332-x?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Just, Aida & J. Anderson, Christopher, 2012. "Immigrants, Citizenship and Political Action in Europe," British Journal of Political Science, Cambridge University Press, vol. 42(3), pages 481-509, July.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Alex Street, 2017. "The Political Effects of Immigrant Naturalization," International Migration Review, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 51(2), pages 323-343, June.
    2. Céline Piton, 2022. "The labour market performance of vulnerable groups: towards a better understanding of the main driving forces," ULB Institutional Repository 2013/352519, ULB -- Universite Libre de Bruxelles.
    3. Juan Galeano & Aurélie Pont & Philippe Wanner, 2022. "A Longitudinal Analysis of Naturalization and International Migration in Switzerland, 2011–2017," Journal of International Migration and Integration, Springer, vol. 23(2), pages 889-910, June.
    4. Jörg Dollmann, 2022. "The Political Integration of Immigrants: How Pre- and Postmigration Contexts Matter," Journal of International Migration and Integration, Springer, vol. 23(3), pages 1091-1125, September.
    5. Harris Hyun-soo Kim, 2017. "In-Group and Out-Group Networks, Informal Social Activities, and Electoral Participation Among Immigrants in South Korea," Journal of International Migration and Integration, Springer, vol. 18(4), pages 1123-1148, November.
    6. Monika Bozhinoska Lazarova & Thomas Saalfeld & Olaf Seifert, 2024. "What Does It Take for Immigrants to Join Political Parties?," Politics and Governance, Cogitatio Press, vol. 12.
    7. Floris Peters & Hans Schmeets & Maarten Vink, 2020. "Naturalisation and Immigrant Earnings: Why and to Whom Citizenship Matters," European Journal of Population, Springer;European Association for Population Studies, vol. 36(3), pages 511-545, July.
    8. Jérôme Gonnot & Federica lo Polito, 2023. "Cultural Transmission and Political Attitudes: Explaining Differences between Natives and Immigrants in Western Europe," Working Papers 2023-12, CEPII research center.
    9. Veronica Riniolo & Livia Elisa Ortensi, 2021. "Young Generations' Activism in Italy: Comparing Political Engagement and Participation of Native Youths and Youths from a Migrant Background," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 153(3), pages 923-955, February.
    10. Keller, Nicolas & Gathmann, Christina & Monscheuer, Ole, 2015. "Citizenship and the Social Integration of Immigrants: Evidence from Germany's Immigration Reforms," VfS Annual Conference 2015 (Muenster): Economic Development - Theory and Policy 113184, Verein für Socialpolitik / German Economic Association.
    11. Gonnot, Jérôme, 2020. "The Evolution of First-Generation Immigrants' Political Preferences in Western Europe," TSE Working Papers 20-1145, Toulouse School of Economics (TSE).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:spr:joimai:v:16:y:2015:i:1:d:10.1007_s12134-014-0332-x. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.