<abstract xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml"><p>This article studies whether immigration in voter’s neighborhoods is a driving factor of the rise of Germany’s major right-wing party <italic>Alternative fuer Deutschland</italic> (AFD) and the decline of Angela Merkel’s center ruling party the <italic>Christian Democratic Union</italic> (CDU). We use the 2015 refugee crisis as a natural experiment to study the short-run impact of refugee presence on the voting behavior in German municipalities. This is the first study to use a spatial econometric framework combining small-scale immigration data, election data, and a set of socioeconomic factors. Our main finding states that the local immigration boosted AFD votes but did not affect CDU votes directly. Instead, in regions that perceived immigration indirectly, that is in neighboring municipalities, the CDU gained fewer votes.</p></abstract>

This article studies whether immigration in voter’s neighborhoods is a driving factor of the rise of Germany’s major right-wing party Alternative fuer Deutschland (AFD) and the decline of Angela Merkel’s center ruling party the Christian Democratic Union (CDU). We use the 2015 refugee crisis as a natural experiment to study the short-run impact of refugee presence on the voting behavior in German municipalities. This is the first study to use a spatial econometric framework combining small-scale immigration data, election data, and a set of socioeconomic factors. Our main finding states that the local immigration boosted AFD votes but did not affect CDU votes directly. Instead, in regions that perceived immigration indirectly, that is in neighboring municipalities, the CDU gained fewer votes.

Refugees welcome, but not in my backyard? The impact of immigration on right-wing voting: evidence from Germany

IZA Journal of Development and Migration

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

This article studies whether immigration in voter’s neighborhoods is a driving factor of the rise of Germany’s major right-wing party Alternative fuer...

Refugees welcome, but not in my backyard? The impact of immigration on right-wing voting: evidence from Germany

Published Online: Aug 03, 2020

Page range: -

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/izajodm-2020-0013

Keywords
Voting behaviour, immigration, unemployment, refugee crisis management, socioeconomic inequality, demographics

© 2020 Johannes Jasny, Tilman Becker, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Refugees welcome, but not in my backyard? The impact of immigration on right-wing voting: evidence from Germany

Published Online: Aug 03, 2020

Page range: -

DOI: https://doi.org/10.2478/izajodm-2020-0013

KeywordsVoting behaviour, immigration, unemployment, refugee crisis management, socioeconomic inequality, demographics

© 2020 Johannes Jasny, Tilman Becker, published by Sciendo

This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.

Keywords
Voting behaviour, immigration, unemployment, refugee crisis management, socioeconomic inequality, demographics