Regionalist Party Mobilisation on Immigration

Abstract

This article explores the various ways in which regionalist parties approach the issue of immigration. Drawing on several cases, it compares how regionalist parties ‘construct’ the territory and how issues of diversity and immigration inform their policy goals. It is shown that mobilisation on immigration varies across regions. Whilst parties in Scotland and Catalonia have encouraged immigration as a way of expanding national membership and bolstering the labour market, those in Bavaria and Northern Italy have viewed immigration as a threat to their culture and economy. This article identifies factors influencing party immigration policies, including party ideology, local party competition, central government policy and other state-wide influences. It also assesses the extent to which European integration has influenced parties' territorial projects, in particular whether parties have responded to pressures to adopt EU norms and common principles, such as diversity and multiculturalism, in order to be perceived as credible.

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Elin Royles, Ailsa Henderson, Simon Jennings, Jonathan Bradbury and the two anonymous referees for their comments on a previous draft of this paper. I also gratefully acknowledge the support provided for this research by the Economic and Social Research Council (grant number PTA-026-27-1484).

Notes

1. Edmund Stoiber, leader of the CSU and Minister-President of Bavaria, maintains that Turkey, as a Muslim nation, should never be let into a ‘club’ of Christian nations (BBC News, 17 September 2002).

2. Extracomunitari refer to those people who come from outside the EU.