Intention to become a Citizen: Do Subnational Integration Policies have an Influence? Empirical Evidence from Swiss Cantons

Increasing ethnic diversity is accompanied by a growing scientific interest in how receiving countries manage this plurality, for instance by means of integration policy. The latter has mainly been scrutinized through a national lens, and examining policy inputs. Little is known about the outcomes of such policies on immigrants and, even less so, at the subnational policy level. Therefore, this paper analyses non-citizens’ response to regional integration policies, focusing on their intention to naturalize, an important indicator for successful immigrant integration. My main argument claims that more inclusive integration policies increase immigrants’ naturalization intention. Swiss cantons represent relevant policy units because they have distinct cultural-linguistic backgrounds, resulting in a very heterogeneous pattern of cantonal integration policies. My main independent variable draws on a comprehensive index classifying the 26 Swiss regional integration policies, measuring the ease or difficulty to access civic, political, socio-structural and cultural-religious rights and obligations. Concerning the dependent variable, naturalization intention, I use the Migration-Mobility Survey 2016, a fresh database including 5973 recently arrived immigrants in Switzerland. This is the first survey providing sufficiently large non-citizen samples per canton and conducted in six languages, guaranteeing the inclusion of non-language-assimilated immigrants. This article addresses three research gaps: First, unlike citizenship laws, comprehensive integration policies are hardly used to predict naturalization intentions. Second, it fosters the so far scarce literature on integration policy outcomes on immigrants. Third, it complements previous migration policy research on the national level by scrutinizing subnational policy heterogeneity. First findings of the multilevel analyses indicate that naturalization intention is indeed higher when integration policies are inclusive, but only after a certain period of exposure to these policies. As the Swiss cantons are powerful political entities in a strongly decentralized federation, the insights emerging from this “microcosm of Europe” are interesting for future cross-country analyses within Europe.