Socio-Economic And Demographic Factors Shaping Attitudes Towards Immigrants in Arab Countries and Turkey

Technical Summary: Socio-Economic And Demographic Factors Shaping Attitudes Towards Immigrants in Arab Countries and Turkey

Problem Statement
Despite hosting a significant portion of the global refugee population—approximately 41.4 million migrants and refugees in Arab countries and Turkey combined as of 2020, with Turkey holding the world's largest refugee population (3.6 million)—there is a scarcity of empirical research analyzing the determinants of attitudes toward immigrants in these regions. While existing literature extensively covers Western nations, studies focusing on Arab countries and Turkey are limited and often yield conflicting results. The paper addresses the gap in understanding how socio-economic and demographic factors (such as education, income, gender, age, marital status, employment, and religiosity) shape public sentiment toward immigrants in Turkey, Lebanon, Jordan, Egypt, and Iraq. The authors note that while theories regarding labor market competition and cultural threats exist, their applicability to these specific host nations remains under-explored, particularly given the unique contexts of long-standing refugee crises (e.g., Palestinians) and recent influxes (e.g., Syrians).

Methodology
The study utilizes secondary data from the World Values Survey (WVS) 7th Wave (2017–2022), the largest cross-national empirical time-series investigation, covering over 120 nations. The analysis focuses on a sample of 5,598 respondents across five countries: Iraq, Egypt, Turkey, Lebanon, and Jordan.

• Dependent Variables: The study employs nine distinct dependent variables representing attitudes toward immigrants, measured via ordered probit models. These variables capture perceptions on:

  1. Immigrants filling important job vacancies.
  2. Immigration increasing crime rates.
  3. Immigration increasing unemployment.
  4. Immigration strengthening cultural diversity.
  5. Immigration increasing terrorism risks.
  6. Immigration leading to social conflict.
  7. The necessity of granting asylum to political refugees.
  8. Immigration offering better living conditions for people from poor countries.
  9. The overall impact of immigrants on national development.
     Responses are measured on a three-point scale (e.g., disagree, hard to say, agree).

• Independent Variables: The econometric model includes the following socio-economic and demographic determinants:

  • Age: Continuous variable.
  • Gender: Binary (Male/Female).
  • Marital Status: Categorical (Married, Single, Divorced/Separated, Widowed).
  • Income Level: Categorical (Low, Medium, High).
  • Education Level: Categorical (Low, Middle, Upper).
  • Employment Status: Categorical (Full-time, Part-time, Self-employed, Retired, Housewife, Student, Unemployed, Other).
  • Religiosity: Binary (Religious, Not Religious).

• Estimation Strategy: The authors estimate nine separate ordered probit regressions, one for each dependent variable, for each of the five countries. Robust standard errors are used to account for heteroskedasticity.

Key Results
The findings reveal significant heterogeneity in the determinants of attitudes across the five countries, challenging the notion of a monolithic "Arab" or "Middle Eastern" perspective on immigration.

• Lebanon: Attitudes are highly polarized and often negative among specific demographics. Older individuals, those with higher education, and high-income earners tend to hold negative views, believing immigrants increase unemployment, crime, terrorism, and social conflict, and fail to strengthen cultural diversity. Conversely, non-religious individuals, housewives, and the unemployed generally hold more positive views regarding security and conflict, though they explicitly believe the country does not offer a better living for immigrants. Notably, non-religious individuals in Lebanon hold opposing views to the general population regarding asylum, believing immigrants should not be granted asylum. The self-employed in Lebanon oppose granting asylum, likely due to economic competition concerns.
• Turkey: Older individuals express more negative attitudes regarding cultural diversity but more positive views on immigrants filling job vacancies. Single individuals show more positive attitudes toward immigrants filling jobs, while divorced/separated individuals show more negative sentiments. Non-religious individuals are more likely to believe immigrants strengthen cultural diversity and do not cause social conflict. The self-employed in Turkey are more pro-refugee, potentially due to the informal labor market dynamics where refugees fill low-wage sectors.
• Jordan: Women are significantly more likely to believe immigrants contribute to higher crime rates, terrorism, and social conflict. Older individuals are more likely to support granting asylum to political refugees. High-income individuals hold more favorable views regarding crime rates.
• Iraq: Higher education is strongly associated with negative attitudes, particularly the belief that immigrants increase unemployment and social conflict. This is attributed to the high labor force participation rate of migrants in Iraq (67% vs. 39% for citizens), intensifying economic competition for the educated. The unemployed in Iraq disagree that their country offers a superior standard of living to refugees.
• Egypt: Results are mixed but generally more tolerant than in other regions regarding social conflict and unemployment. Higher education is associated with positive attitudes (disagreeing that immigrants increase unemployment or crime). However, part-time employees in Egypt are less supportive of granting asylum to political refugees, likely due to economic insecurity.

Significance and Contributions
The paper claims to fill a critical gap in the literature by providing a comparative analysis of attitude determinants in five major host nations that have historically been emigration countries but have recently become major immigration destinations.

1. Contextual Nuance: The study demonstrates that factors like education and income do not have uniform effects across the region. For instance, while higher education often correlates with tolerance in Western literature, in Iraq and Lebanon, it correlates with negative attitudes due to perceived economic threats and cultural preservation concerns.
2. Demographic Specificity: The research highlights the role of marital status and employment type in shaping views, noting that divorced individuals often exhibit more pessimism, while the self-employed in Turkey show unique pro-refugee tendencies driven by labor market realities.
3. Policy Relevance: By identifying which specific demographic groups hold negative or positive views in each country, the paper suggests that anti-immigrant sentiment is not uniform but driven by specific local economic and cultural anxieties (e.g., labor competition in Iraq, sectarian balance in Lebanon, and cultural identity in Turkey).

The authors conclude that their findings add to the empirical understanding of refugee reception in the Global South, emphasizing that "host country" attitudes are shaped by a complex interplay of local economic conditions, historical contexts, and specific demographic vulnerabilities, rather than a single universal theory.