Narrative Publications

Impact of Public Attitudes to migration on the political environment in the Euro-Mediterranean Region

• The more immigration is important in the public debate, the more seats far-right parties tend to win. In other words, the number of seats won by radical right parties in a country closely follows the salience of immigration when measured as the percentage of people saying it is one of the most important issues affecting their country.

• Reporting tends to follow consumer preferences, rather than vice versa (Gentzkow and Shapiro, 2010), the effects of media reporting on political attitudes tend to be non-durable. However, media reporting is likely to affect what is on the political agenda.

• Individuals are only likely to re-consider their political behaviour if their emotions are engaged by that issue. Only salient issues engage emotions. On the other hand, issues that individuals do not consider to be salient, or important, will not cause them to change their attitudes and behaviour because they do not become emotionally engaged with them.

• Based on the models developed in this report, it is likely that radical right parties are likely to win in excess of 21% of European Parliament seats in 2019, slightly more than the 18% of seats they won in 2014.

How does the media on both sides of the Mediterranean report on migration?

This Study “How does the media on both sides of the Mediterranean report on migration?” was carried out and prepared by the Ethical Journalism Network and commissioned in the framework of EUROMED Migration IV (EMM4, 2016-2019). The objective of this project, financed by the European Union and implemented by ICMPD, is to support EU Member States and ENI Southern Partner Countries in establishing a comprehensive, constructive and operational dialogue and co-operation framework, with a particular focus on reinforcing instruments and capacities to develop and implement evidence- based and coherent migration and international protection policies. In order to achieve this objective, EMM 4 builds upon the results of the first three phases of the project (2004-2015) and tailors its activities around two pillars: the first pillar facilitates effective North-South and South- South regional dialogues and co-operation in the four main fields of migration and international protection-related matters (legal migration; irregular migration; migration and development; international protection and asylum). The second pillar focuses on capacity-building by applying a new outcome-oriented approach that includes sub- regional activities, tailor-made national training programmes and targeted technical assistance packages for committed partners. Both pillars are supported by a horizontal and cross-cutting thread aimed at accumulating evidence-based knowledge and establishing effective communication in order to contribute to a more balanced narrative on migration.