Social Solidarity, Welfare Chauvinism and Healthcare: Migrants in the UK

• In Event: Understanding Support for Immigration in Western Europe

Abstract

The bonds of social solidarity underpin the welfare state, yet a growing body of research show such bonds depend on membership. Many citizens are ‘welfare chauvinists’ – willing to support extensive protections for fellow citizens or ethnic group members, but unwilling to extend solidarity to outsiders. Yet the conditions when solidarity does, or does not, cross group boundaries are still poorly understood. In this paper, we present results from X randomised survey experiments focussing on a ‘best case’ scenario where solidarity should be easiest to extend: the British National Health Service (NHS) during COVID. Solidarity should be easier to extend when a service is explicitly open to all, is seen as essential, and enjoys broad public support. All of these apply to the NHS, with particular intensity during the pandemic. Our experiments show that, even in this best case scenario, solidarity is not extended by all citizens to immigrant outsiders. The extension of solidarity depends on the values of citizens. Those who have internalised norms of inclusive tolerance consistently extend solidarity equally to insiders and outsiders in all of our experiments. Those who reject such norms show an equally strong tendency to discriminate against outsiders

Authors

• Robert Ford, University of Manchester

• Scott Blinder, University of Massachusetts, Amherst

• Elisabeth Ivarsflaten, University of Bergen