Replication Data for: How Settlement Locations and Local Networks Influence Immigrant Political Integration

To what extent do early experiences in the host country shape the political integration of immigrants? We argue that the initial neighborhoods immigrants settle in establish patterns of behavior that influence subsequent political participation. Using Norwegian administrative register data, we leverage quasi-exogenous variation in the placement of refugees to assess the consequences of assignment to particular neighborhoods. We find that the difference in electoral turnout between refugees initially placed in 20th and 80th percentile neighborhoods is 12.6 percentage points, which represents 47 percent of the participation gap between refugees and residents. To assess the mechanism, we draw on individual-level data on all neighbors present at the time of each refugees' arrival, and evaluate the relative impact of neighborhood characteristics and available social networks. Our findings suggest that while neighborhood socioeconomic factors play a limited role, early exposure to politically engaged neighbors and peer cohorts increases immigrants' electoral participation over the long run.

东道国的早期经历在多大程度上塑造了移民的政治融入？我们提出，移民最初定居的邻里环境会形成特定行为模式，进而影响其后续的政治参与行为。本研究采用挪威行政登记数据，利用难民安置过程中的准外生安置差异，评估被分配至特定邻里环境所产生的影响。研究发现，最初被安置在20百分位与80百分位邻里的难民，其选举投票率差距达12.6个百分点，这一差距占难民与本地居民政治参与差距的47%。为探究其作用机制，我们借助每位难民抵达时在场的所有邻居的个体层面数据，对比分析邻里特征与既有社会网络的相对影响。研究结果表明，尽管邻里社会经济因素的作用较为有限，但早期接触积极参与政治活动的邻居与同辈群体，可长期提升移民的选举参与率。