The implications of democratisation, economic development, and immigration for xenophobia in East-Central Europe

This paper examines factors associated with xenophobia in Poland, Hungary, Czech Republic, Slovakia, Slovenia, Croatia, Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Romania, Ukraine, and Belarus using a representative sample survey in each country carried out in 1998 (N=12643). This paper considers how xenophobia (based upon an xenophobia index) is related to democratisation, prosperity, growth, and migration. In general, there is more xenophobia with higher growth and prosperity and once the effect of other variables is taken into account, xenophobia decreases with democratisation. The strongest correlation is between xenophobia and the number of registered migrants living in the society. However, those countries with the highest xenophobia are also those countries negotiating accession to the EU and Poland, with the highest number of illegal migrants, is an exception. It is suggested therefore that we need to take into account the situation of migrants in different societies and the fact that migration becomes an issue during EU accession negotiations in such a way that xenophobia may actually increase as a result.