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Voting about immigration policy: What does the Swiss experience tell us?

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  • Miguet, Florence

Abstract

This paper draws on Swiss direct democracy to review the Swiss experience with immigration, which has been shaped strongly by regular voting on immigration policies. Relying on two unique post-vote data-sets on how Swiss citizens voted on initiatives directed at containing the proportion of foreigners in the population, we improve on past empirical evidence by by-passing the problem of "hypothetical bias" present in the analysis of conventional survey data. Controlling for the participation bias due to non-mandatory voting, we find evidence that the hypothetical bias hampering pre-vote surveys may be large but that turnout does not have a decisive influence on the outcome of a vote. Confirming political-economy predictions, education matters in the shaping of immigration preferences but non-economic arguments also play an important role.

Suggested Citation

  • Miguet, Florence, 2008. "Voting about immigration policy: What does the Swiss experience tell us?," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 24(3), pages 628-641, September.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:poleco:v:24:y:2008:i:3:p:628-641
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    2. Azarnert, Leonid V., 2010. "Immigration, fertility, and human capital: A model of economic decline of the West," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 26(4), pages 431-440, December.
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    5. Olivier Bargain & Victor Stephane & Jérôme Valette, 2022. "Another brick in the wall. Immigration and electoral preferences: Direct evidence from state ballots," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 30(5), pages 1452-1477, November.
    6. Marfouk, Abdeslam, 2013. "Préjugés et fausses idées sur l’immigration et les immigrés, vecteurs de discrimination en matière d’accès à l’emploi [false ideas about immigrants and immigration and discrimination in labor market]," MPRA Paper 47989, University Library of Munich, Germany.
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    8. Fatih Cakmak & Erkan Oktay, 2017. "Research of Internal Migration by Compartment Models: The Case of Erzurum-Bursa," International Journal of Research in Business and Social Science (2147-4478), Center for the Strategic Studies in Business and Finance, vol. 6(1), pages 127-148, January.
    9. Brunner, Beatrice & Kuhn, Andreas, 2014. "Immigration, Cultural Distance and Natives' Attitudes Towards Immigrants: Evidence from Swiss Voting Results," IZA Discussion Papers 8409, IZA Network @ LISER.
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    11. Krishnakumar, Jaya & Müller, Tobias, 2012. "The political economy of immigration in a direct democracy: The case of Switzerland," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 56(2), pages 174-189.
    12. Aguiar-Conraria, Luís & Magalhães, Pedro C., 2010. "How quorum rules distort referendum outcomes: Evidence from a pivotal voter model," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 26(4), pages 541-557, December.
    13. Cooray, Arusha & Marfouk, Abdeslam & Nazir, Maliha, 2018. "Public Opinion and Immigration: Who Favors Employment Discrimination against Immigrants?," GLO Discussion Paper Series 175, Global Labor Organization (GLO).
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    15. Bougheas, Spiros & Nelson, Doug, 2013. "On the political economy of high skilled migration and international trade," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 206-224.
    16. Lena Calahorrano, 2011. "Population Aging and Individual Attitudes toward Immigration: Disentangling Age, Cohort and Time Effects," SOEPpapers on Multidisciplinary Panel Data Research 389, DIW Berlin, The German Socio-Economic Panel (SOEP).
    17. Azarnert, Leonid V., 2018. "Refugee resettlement, redistribution and growth," European Journal of Political Economy, Elsevier, vol. 54(C), pages 89-98.
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    21. Giuseppe Russo, 2011. "Voting over selective immigration policies with immigration aversion," Economics of Governance, Springer, vol. 12(4), pages 325-351, December.

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