Migrant Residential Segregation as a Neglected Driver of Support for Radical Right Parties?

The link between migration and electoral outcomes has attracted increasing academic attention in recent years, especially in the context of the steady rise in support for radical right parties (RRPs) across Europe since 2014. Existing studies have focused on the electoral implications of asylum-seeker reception centres or of overall migrant shares within localities, providing mixed support for either ‘contact’ or ‘group conflict’ theories. Our study complements this literature by examining the (so far neglected) role of migrant residential segregation as an additional potential driver of radical-right support, due to its influence on the likelihood of intergroup contact. Adopting a place-based, spatial, and relational perspective, we analyse two dimensions of segregation (isolation and dissimilarity) and their spatial aggregation to examine their association with the electoral performance of RRPs in Italy’s 2022 national election. In doing so, we combine OLS and spatial regression models with geographically weighted regression models. Our analyses yield three main findings. First, segregation does influence local support for RRPs, though its two dimensions operate in opposite directions, with isolation being the strongest predictor. Second, these effects are not geographically uniform and vary significantly across the country. Third, we outline possible explanations for this spatial heterogeneity, suggesting that segregation becomes a stronger predictor of radical-right support in localities with a higher unemployment rate and more rural localities. These findings remain robust when adding for a wide range of controls (including, among others, a wide range of structural and contextual factors and information about the presence and capacity of asylum-seeker reception centres) and are confirmed using alternative model specifications. These results have important policy implications for authorities involved in urban planning, and they underscore the importance of considering segregation, in all its complexity, when examining the drivers of far-right electoral support.