Relative Social Standing and Support for Nativism

This paper explores the relationship between relative social standing and one’s attitude towards descent-based national membership using multi-level analysis. While much of the previous research on national identity has focused on the individual-level socioeconomic predictors, little attention has been paid to the role of relative deprivation. In this study, I investigate the effect of relative deprivation on one’s nativist attitudes by exploring the individual-level effects of education and income in conjunction with the societal level of inequality in 29 countries, using International Social Survey Program (ISSP 2003 National Identity module) data. I create a new dependent variable “ancestry” which measures how much importance one places on ancestry as a core component of national identity. I examine the relationships between country's characteristics (economic conditions, income inequality, size of foreign-born and college-educated populations), individual characteristics (socioeconomic status, occupational position, religiosity, and political party affiliation), and one’s support for ancestry-based national membership. My findings suggest that, at the individual level, non-college graduates and low-wage earners are more likely to support ancestry-based national membership. However, at the country-level, high school graduates living in highly educated societies and countries with larger foreign-born populations are more likely to support descent-based national membership. In other words, non-college graduates in societies with high percentages of foreign-borns and college graduates may feel more vulnerable and show greater support for social closure against migrants through restrictive descent-based citizenship. As for income, low-income earners living in countries with greater income inequality are less likely to endorse ancestry as an important criterion of national membership. In line with the relative deprivation theory, this finding indicates that marginalized groups in countries with greater inequality (e.g. income inequality) are less likely to feel discontent and entitled compared to their counterparts in more egalitarian societies.