Lauren M. McLaren

Anti-Immigrant Prejudice in Europe: Contact, Threat Perception, and Preferences for the Exclusion of Migrants

This article introduces the theoretical approaches of contact, group conflict, and symbolic prejudice to explain levels of exclusionary feelings toward a relatively new minority in the West European context, the immigrant. The findings indicate that even after controls for perceived threat are included in the model, intimate contact with members of minority groups in the form of friendships can reduce levels of willingness to expel legal immigrants from the country. A contextual variable, level of immigration to the country, is also introduced into the model because it is likely that this variable affects both threat perception and exclusionary feelings. While context does not seem to directly affect levels of willingness to expel or include immigrants in the society, it does have a rather powerful impact on perceived threat. Perhaps even more importantly, the findings suggest that contact mediates the effect of the environment, helping to produce lower levels of threat perception in contexts of high immigration.

Public Support for the European Union: Cost/Benefit Analysis or Perceived Cultural Threat?

This research note argues that much of the literature on support for European integration misses the heart of the nature of opposition to this process by ignoring the notion of perceived threat. Essentially, people are hostile toward the European project in great part because of their perceptions of threats posed by other cultures. I analyze this hypothesis by replicating a piece of research that previously appeared in this journal, adding measures of perceived threat to that model. The results support the main contention, which is that perceived cultural threat is an important factor that has been mistakenly ignored in explanations of hostility toward the European Union.

Identity, Interests and Attitudes to European Integration

To what degree do citizens of EU member states support its institutions, and how much do perceptions of those institutions depend upon fundamental feelings of identity? In Identity, Interests and Attitudes to European Integration, Lauren M. McLaren outlines explanations of varying feelings towards the European Union and the integration project, focusing on egoistic self-interest and the perceived threat to ones group. The book introduces new evidence that questions the degree to which Europeans think about the EU in utilitarian terms and contemplates the other lenses through which ordinary citizens might view the EU, particularly those that identify and reject it. Ultimately, the book contends that feelings about the EU may be related more to general xenophobia and out-group rejection than to cost/benefit calculations about whether the EU satisfies ones self-interest.

Resources, Group Conflict and Symbols: Explaining Anti‐Immigration Hostility in Britain

This article analyses the causes of variation in attitudes to immigration policy in the UK. The key theoretical approaches emphasised are: the role of self-interest; group conflict over resources; and group conflict over important symbols of Britishness. The connection between perceptions of immigration and crime is also investigated. Based on the 2003 British Social Attitudes Survey, the findings indicate that self-interest has very little bearing on opposition to immigration and that British citizens instead appear to be most concerned with threats to ingroup resources posed by immigration, threats to the shared customs and traditions of British society (particularly those posed by Muslims) and – to a lesser extent – the potential for increased crime that may result from immigration.

Explaining Opposition to Turkish Membership of the EU

This article examines EU citizen attitudes to Turkeys bid to join the EU. The key theoretical constructs investigated to explain opposition to Turkeys EU membership are related to rational economic self-interest and group-level interests and concerns. The findings indicate that the former are irrelevant for distinguishing between opponents and supporters of Turkeys candidacy, while the latter do provide fairly powerful explanations for opposition to Turkish EU membership. However, because these factors do not completely explain overall levels of hostility to Turkeys candidacy, context is also introduced, particularly the threatening context provided by Turkish migration. The findings indicate that migration from Turkey to some of the EU member states has combined with feelings of group protectiveness to produce widespread animosity to Turkeys entry into the EU.

Immigration and the new politics of inclusion and exclusion in the European Union: The effect of elites and the EU on individual–level opinions regarding European and non–European immigrants

Within European politics, a distinction is currently being made at the elite level between internal and external immigration, with individuals from EU countries being given special rights and privileges when they migrate within the EU. This paper addresses the question of whether individual EU citizens also view the two types of immigrants differently and what structures their beliefs regarding these two sources of migration. The findings indicate that (a) the vast majority of EU citizens view internal and external migration as identical and (b) elite cues and debates regarding immigration within each of the countries are helping individuals form their opinions regarding the two different types of immigration. These findings and their implications are discussed in the body of the paper.

The Cultural Divide in Europe: Migration, Multiculturalism, and Political Trust

One of the defining features of modern states is their incorporation of notions of political and social community based on shared language, history, and myths. However, large numbers of citizens in modern states have come to believe their national communities are under threat from several modern forces, including immigration. Using the European Social Survey (2002–9), this article explores the extent to which perceived threats posed by large-scale immigration undermine national political communities by reducing trust in national politicians and political institutions. The findings indicate that even after controlling for other predictors of trust in the political system, concerns about the effect of immigration on the national community have an impact on trust in politics. Moreover, having a lengthy postwar history with mass immigration mediates this effect, while the potentially mobilizing effects of far-right parties on the relationship between concern about immigration and political distrust are somewhat limited.

Turkey's Eventual Membership of the EU: Turkish Elite Perspectives on the Issue

Relations between the European Union (EU) and Turkey have tended to waver between being semi-cordial and extremely strained. Throughout this rather long history of attempts at establishing close ties between the two parties, not much has been known about Turkish opinion regarding the EU. Thus, it is hoped that the current research can provide some insight into Turkish opinions relating to Turkey’s application for full membership to the EU by interviewing Turkish elites – academics, businessmen, journalists, and government ministers. Specifically, do they favour Turkey eventually joining the EU, and are they hopeful about this happening in the near future? Also, what do these individuals perceive to be the main reason that Turkey has not been admitted into the European Union, which countries do they perceive to be against Turkey’s full membership, and European Agenda

Turkish Parliamentarians' Perspectives on Turkey's Relations with the European Union

Turkey is currently one of the 13 candidates for European Union (EU) membership. Among these candidates, it has a long association with the EU (since 1963) and the oldest standing application for membership (since 1987). Despite this history, when the EU embarked on its enlargement process in the 1990s it did not include Turkey in its list of prospective candidates. During the Luxembourg summit of December 1997, the European Council decided to clear the path for the Union’s enlargement towards the Central and Eastern European countries and Cyprus, basing its decision upon the European Commission’s proposal in its Agenda 2000 of July 1997. 1 However, it was only quite recently, during the Helsinki summit of the European Council of December 1999, that the EU included Turkey in this process of enlargement by granting it candidacy. Officially, the major obstacle to Turkey’s accession is the need to meet the Copenhagen criteria adopted in 1993, 2 but there are other important obstacles that are not part of the Copenhagen criteria which still play a significant role in the accession process, such as Turkey’s relations with Greece—a member of the EC/EU since 1981. Particularly important within the general framework of Turkey’s relations with Greece is the Cyprus problem. The EU’s Accession Partnership Document (APD) of November 2001 has included the resolution of the Cyprus issue among the medium term objectives that Turkey must meet. Thus, Turkey’s adherence to the Copenhagen criteria will officially determine when and under what conditions the EU will begin accession negotiations with Turkey, but the resolution of the Cyprus conflict is likely to be an equally important factor in determining the opening date for Turkey’s accession negotiations. It is, therefore, important to assess the extent to which the Turkish public and its representatives are aware of the critical importance of these factors. Throughout this often turbulent history of relations between the EU and Turkey very little was known about how Turkish citizens view these relations. This analysis begins by briefly reviewing Turkish-EU relations 11

Immigration and Trust in Politics in Britain

A previously overlooked explanation for varying individual levels of political trust is concern about immigration. This article examines the effect of concern about immigration on political trust in Britain, where levels of opposition to immigration have remained high since the 1960s and yet the implications of such opposition are still unclear. Using the pre-election and post-election panel component of the 2005 British Election Study and the 2002–03 European Social Survey, the author shows, after controlling for other predictors of trust in politics, that concerns about the impact of immigration significantly affect political trust. In addition, in 2005 the perception that government had not handled the issue of immigration effectively also significantly affected political trust, with both linear and interactive effects.