Are we really going to get out of COVID-19 together? Secured legal status and trust among refugees and migrants

Abstract

Building up on pre-existing vulnerabilities and social exclusions, refugees and migrants are disproportionately suffering from the negative effects of the COVID-19 outbreak. Insecure legal status is an additional stressor that may accentuate social cleavages and ultimately impair their trust in host society and institutions. Based on a diverse sample of refugees and migrants in Belgium (N = 355), the present study investigates direct and indirect effects of legal status—measured as the type of residence permit held by participants—on social and political trust during the COVID-19 outbreak. Secured legal status was positively associated with social and political trust directly, and indirectly via a serial mediation composed by two cumulative stages. First, participants with a more secured legal status experienced less material difficulties to cope with the pandemic (i.e., first material stage). Second, participant who experienced less material difficulties identified more with the host society (i.e., second symbolic stage). In turn, reduced material difficulties and increased identification with the host society were both positively associated with social and political trust. Our findings advocate for securing legal status of refugees and migrants to help societies cope cohesively with the long-lasting effects of the COVID-19 outbreak.

Immigrants as natural supporters? Cross‐nation analysis with a multilevel mixed‐effects model

“…Similar to most surveys, reaching out to immigrant communities is difficult due to language barriers, unfamiliarity with institutions at the destination, and other factors (Laganà et al, 2013). Importantly, research has shown that marginalized immigrants, characterized by lower socioeconomic positions, increased experiences of discrimination, and precarious legal status, are more likely to report lower levels of trust in host-country institutions (De Vroome et al, 2013;Politi et al, 2022;Ziller & Heizmann, 2020). By examining immigrants in multiple countries within the integrated datasets of WVS (2017-21) and EVS (2017-21), the total number of immigrants is substantial (N = 9,023, 6.7% of the sample size).…”