Electoral participation among immigrants in Sweden: Integration, culture and participation

Modern states claim to be democratic. However, foreign citizens who are legal residents are denied voting and other political rights. In 1975, Sweden granted voting rights in local elections to all foreign citizens who had been resident in Sweden for three years. However, only a small majority, 60 per cent, of the enfranchised foreign citizens voted in the 1976 elections. In 1991, the figure was as low as 41 per cent. One of the two main questions discussed here is how integration into one's own group and integration into the majority society affect electoral participation. The second question takes up differences in cultural orientations between immigrant groups and how these are related to voting behaviour. This is done with the help of Mary Douglas’ theory of group and grid, as developed by Thompson, Ellis and Wildavsky. The empirical data was collected through interviews with four different immigrant groups in the city of Malmö, Southern Sweden. The central explanatory variables, expressed in terms of integration and cultural orientations, shed light upon differences in immigrant electoral participation. While integration into the majority society and a cultural orientation called hierarchalism favour electoral participation, the contrary is true for the cultural orientation here named fatalism.