Should Immigrants Culturally Assimilate or Preserve Their Own Culture? Individual Beliefs and the Longevity of National Identity

Arbeitspapier

We develop and empirically test a theory concerning individual beliefs about whether immigrants should culturally assimilate into the host society or preserve their own cultural norms. We argue that when national identity is a source of intrinsic utility, the longevity of national identity influences a national identity’s perceived resilience to an ostensible immigrant threat and, thus, affects individuals’ beliefs about the need for immigrants’ cultural assimilation. Empirical evidence based on data from countries of wider Europe supports our theory. An expert survey-based measure of the longevity of national identity, first, exhibits a robustly negative effect on the strength of individual preferences in favor of immigrants’ cultural assimilation and, second, is an important contextual moderating variable that shapes the effect of individual-level characteristics on their beliefs. Thus, individual beliefs about the necessity of immigrants’ cultural assimilation versus accommodation of cultural diversity reflect a historically-rooted sense of national identity.

Angaben zum Objekt

• Sprache: Englisch

Verweise und Beziehungen

• Erschienen in: Series: CESifo Working Paper ; No. 6470

Klassifikation und Themen

• Klassifikation: Wirtschaft ; Economic Sociology; Economic Anthropology; Language; Social and Economic Stratification ; Demographic Economics: Public Policy ; Political Processes: Rent-seeking, Lobbying, Elections, Legislatures, and Voting Behavior ; Comparative Analysis of Economic Systems
• Thema: cultural assimilation ; immigrants ; individual beliefs ; national identity ; longevity

Beteiligte, Orts- und Zeitangaben

• Ereignis: Geistige Schöpfung
• (wer): Grajzl, Peter ; Eastwood, Jonathan ; Dimitrova-Grajzl, Valentina
• Ereignis: Veröffentlichung
• (wer): Center for Economic Studies and ifo Institute (CESifo)
• (wo): Munich
• (wann): 2017

Weitere Informationen

• Handle: http://hdl.handle.net/10419/161909
• Letzte Aktualisierung: 10.03.2025, 11:43 MEZ