Replication Data for: Overcoming the Political Exclusion of Migrants: Theory and Experimental Evidence from India

Migrants are politically marginalized in cities of the developing world, participating in destination-area elections less than local-born residents. We theorize three reasons for this shortfall: migrants’ socio-economic links to origin regions; bureaucratic obstacles to enrollment that disproportionately burden newcomers; and ostracism by anti-migrant politicians. We randomized a door-to-door drive to facilitate voter registration among internal migrants to two Indian cities. Ties to origin regions do not predict willingness to become registered locally. Meanwhile, assistance in navigating the electoral bureaucracy increased migrant registration rates by 24 percentage points and substantially boosted next-election turnout. An additional treatment arm informed politicians about the drive in a subset of localities; rather than ignoring new migrant voters, elites amplified campaign efforts in response. We conclude that onerous registration requirements impede the political incorporation, and thus the wellbeing, of migrant communities in fast-urbanizing settings. The findings also matter for assimilating naturalized yet politically excluded cross-border immigrants.在发展中国家的城市中，移民在政治上处于边缘化地位，其参与目的地选区选举的比例远低于本地出生居民。我们针对这一参与缺口提出了三大理论成因：移民与原籍地区的社会经济联系、不成比例地加重新移民负担的选民登记官僚障碍，以及反移民政客的排斥行为。 我们针对印度两座城市的国内移民（internal migrants）开展了一项随机化入户动员行动，以协助其完成选民登记。研究发现，与原籍地区的联系并不能预测移民在本地完成登记的意愿。 与此同时，协助办理选举相关行政手续的举措，将移民的登记率提升了24个百分点，并显著提高了其在下次选举中的投票率。另有一组实验处理向部分地区的政客通报了此次动员行动；结果显示，政治精英非但没有忽视新增的移民选民，反而加大了竞选动员力度。 我们由此得出结论：严苛的登记要求阻碍了快速城市化背景下移民社区的政治融入，进而损害其福祉。本研究结论对于接纳已入籍但仍在政治上被排除在外的跨境移民同样具有参考意义。