Alexander Yarkin (Brown University)

Learning from the Origins: Immigrants’ Networks, Political Attitudes, and the European Refugee Crisis

Abstract

This paper documents real-time transmission of anti-refugee sentiment, right-wing voting and other salient political opinions via international migration networks. It shows that social and political change at the origins spills over to 1st- and 2nd-generation immigrants living elsewhere. These spillovers are stronger for immigrants less socially integrated into their host societies. Three channels facilitate the transmission: local co-ethnic diasporas, social media connections to the origins, and cross border family ties. Using the variation in exposure to the European Refugee Crisis across countries and time periods, I show that salient events trigger learning from the origins: cross-border spillovers of anti-refugee sentiment activate when the Crisis hits the origins. Right-wing populist voting among the diasporas responds to origin-country exposure. Using the new data from Google Trends and Facebook, I show that (i) elevated attention to events at the origin, and (ii) network homophily are the mechanisms behind these cross-border spillover effects. Additional evidence from the staggered passage of same-sex marriage laws across European countries reveals similar spillover effects. 

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