Can Narratives of White Identity Reduce Opposition to Immigration and Support for Hard Brexit? A Survey Experiment
| Published date | 01 February 2019 |
| DOI | 10.1177/0032321717740489 |
| Date | 01 February 2019 |
| Author | Eric Kaufmann |
| Subject Matter | Articles |
https://doi.org/10.1177/0032321717740489
Political Studies
2019, Vol. 67(1) 31 –46
© The Author(s) 2017
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DOI: 10.1177/0032321717740489
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Can Narratives of White
Identity Reduce Opposition
to Immigration and Support
for Hard Brexit? A Survey
Experiment
Eric Kaufmann
Abstract
Britain’s vote to leave the European Union highlights the importance of White majority opposition
to immigration. This article presents the results of a survey experiment examining whether
priming an open form of ethno-nationalism based on immigrant assimilation reduces hostility to
immigration and support for right-wing populism in Britain. Results show that drawing attention
to the idea that assimilation leaves the ethnic majority unchanged significantly reduces hostility to
immigration and support for Hard Brexit in the UK. Treatment effects are strongest among UK
Independence Party, Brexit and White working-class voters. This is arguably the first example of
an experimental treatment leading to more liberal immigration policy preferences.
Keywords
Brexit, immigration, experiment, nationalism, majority ethnicity
Accepted: 13 October 2017
The politics of immigration has become increasingly prominent in the West. On 23 June
2016, in a vote driven by opposition to European Union (EU) immigration (Evans and
Mellon, 2016), Britain voted to leave the EU. Research has consistently shown that popu-
list right voting is predicted by immigration attitudes, which in turn are associated with
cultural motivations, notably ethnic nationalism (Citrin and Sides, 2008; Hainmueller and
Hopkins, 2014; Heath and Tilley, 2005). Building on this, I suggest ethnic nationalists are
not monolithic, but fall into two groups, open and closed, with the former amenable to
changing their immigration policy preferences. This is demonstrated through a survey
experiment which primes open ethnic nationalism to shift immigration attitudes in a liberal
direction. Past experiments have primed nationalist sentiment to heighten opposition to
Birkbeck College, University of London, London, UK
Corresponding author:
Eric Kaufmann, Department of Politics, Birkbeck College, University of London, Malet Street,
London WC1E 7HX, UK.
Email: e.kaufmann@bbk.ac.uk
740489PSX0010.1177/0032321717740489Political StudiesKaufmann
research-article2017
Article
32 Political Studies 67(1)
immigration (i.e. Sniderman et al., 2004), but none I am aware of have succeeded in reduc-
ing it. In addition to contributing to scholarship, the findings inform policy by suggesting
new forms of political communication which speak to the cultural anxieties of populist
right voters.
The article presents the results of a survey experiment conducted in Britain 2 months
after the Referendum on EU membership in the midst of a debate over whether the coun-
try should opt for a ‘Soft Brexit’, accepting freedom of movement from the EU in
exchange for access to the Single Market, or ‘Hard Brexit’, restricting freedom of move-
ment at the expense of losing market access. These positions are operationalised through
the use of a Contingent Valuation (CV) approach which asks respondents to make trade-
offs between personal income and immigration levels. Respondents are allocated into
three groups, with one treatment group reading a vignette about how immigrants tend to
assimilate into the ethnic majority. The study examines the effect of this ‘assimilation
treatment’ on the immigration policy preferences of respondents, focusing in particular on
culturally conservative White British voters.
National Identity and Immigration Policy Preferences
This article contributes to scholarship on the relationship between national identity and
immigration policy preferences. A considerable body of work locates an association
between ‘ethnic’ or exclusive definitions of the nation and opposition to immigration
(Citrin et al., 1990, 2001; Citrin and Wright, 2009; Coenders, 2001; Heath and Tilley,
2005; Pehrson et al., 2009; Schildkraut, 2014; Wong, 2010). A smaller number of stud-
ies seek to establish causal links between national identity and attitudes to immigration
using survey experiments which prime national identity. Few of these have been able to
manipulate anti-immigration policy preferences, as opposed to perceptions of immi-
grants or the number of immigrants. One study does however find that attitudes to
minorities can be improved by priming civic nationalism (Charnysh et al., 2015). Louis
et al. (2013: 131) uncover an indirect relationship among Australian and Canadian
respondents between reading a prime on national identification and opposing immigra-
tion, but no unmediated effect. Wright and Citrin (2010) find that White American
respondents respond less negatively to images of Latino protests when the protestors
wave American rather than Mexican flags, though this does not prompt individuals to
accept higher immigration levels. Breton (2015) shows in the Canadian case that
reminding respondents of their national identity also has no significant effect on immi-
gration attitudes. An important exception is the classic study by Sniderman et al. (2004:
44–45), who report that priming Dutch rather than personal identity increases anti-
immigration sentiment – but this is true only among those with low prior hostility to
immigration.
The aforementioned experimental studies treat national identity as an ordinal variable,
but as Breton (2015: 375) notes, national identity is unlikely to be unidimensional when
multiple traditions (i.e. Smith, 1997) of nationhood coexist. Recent theoretical and quali-
tative advances point to the importance of peer-to-peer emergence ‘from below’ rather
than elite diffusion in constructing national identity (Fox, 2014). If national identity is in
large measure a complex system emerging from the disparate constructions of a pluralis-
tic mass public, the content of this identity will vary between individuals and groups
(Kaufmann, 2016). Thus, a nation may be ‘ethnic’ and ‘civic’ at once, with competing
conceptions of nationhood within the population (Hutchinson, 2005).
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