IMMIGRATION AND EUROSCEPTICISM – HAND IN HAND? A research on the effect of the refugee crisis on the relationship between attitudes toward immigration and public Euroscepticism.

Abstract

The refugee crisis of 2015 proved to be a tough challenge for Europe and the EU. All EU member states were affected, although to varying degrees. This article seeks to examine the impact of the refugee crisis on the relationship between immigration attitudes and public Euroscepticism. Given that a record number of refugees came to Sweden in 2015, Sweden constitutes an interesting case. Earlier research shows that Euroscepticism has been growing in the wake of European crises. However, a majority of earlier research discusses party-based Euroscepticism. This paper instead looks further into the less researched field of public Euroscepticism. In doing so, it applies ethnic threat theory. This paper uses OLS regression analyses of European Social Survey data (2016) to assess differences in the relationship between immigration attitudes and public Euroscepticism, as immigration increases. Applying a “most similar case design”, it compares Swedish regions which received few to those which received many asylum seekers, relative to their regional population size. The primary finding of this research is that the number of refugees taken in by the regions does not affect the relationship between attitudes towards immigration and Euroscepticism, which contradicts the ethnic threat theory.