Gender and attitudes towards immigrants: Exploring threat perceptions

Abstract

Throughout the years, great attention has been paid to the gender gap in political attitudes. Whereas the differences reported by scholars are not large, they are not negligible either. Consequently, the literature highlights the divergent preferences of women and men regarding such issues as public welfare spending and punishment, not to mention issues that particularly affect women, such as gender quotas. Yet, there are many political topics in which there is a lack of stable trends regarding gender effects. This seems to be the case with attitudes toward immigration. This chapter aims to enhance our understanding of the effects of gender on public attitudes toward immigrants. It provides a comprehensive literature review of the topic, complemented by a brief empirical analysis of nine countries. In line with previous studies, the tendency for women (vis-à-vis men) to perceive immigrants as a hindrance to the economy is corroborated. By contrast, women seem to be less concerned about immigration’s impact on crime –which is a less steady output in the literature. The broadly hinted propensity of women to positively appraise immigrants’ influence on their countries’ culture is not confirmed, proving that the relationship between gender and attitudes toward immigrants is complex and multifaceted.