CfP Panel “Exploring the Missing Links of Migrant Enfranchisement”- 2022 ECPR General Conference

Panel Chairs: Sebastián Umpierrez de Reguero (Leiden University) and Johanna Peltoniemi (University of Helsinki)

ECPR General Conference University, Innsbruck (Austria)- 22-26 August- Section “S21- International Migration Governance: Policies and Practices in Diverse Societies” (endorsed by the ECPR Standing Group Migration and Ethnicity)

Panel abstract: Ever-increasing international migration has stirred debates in the public sphere questioning the democratic dimension of political inclusion, specifically migrant voting. More states grant more political rights than ever before, including allowing foreign residents (immigrants or non-citizen residents) to vote in the residence country and non-resident nationals (emigrants and descendants or non-resident citizens) to vote from abroad in home-country elections. Previous research on enfranchisement—or the process of granting migrant voting rights—tend to theorize the normative reasons for granting or withholding such rights, or focus on the effects of these rights, such as migrant voter turnout and transnational state- or party-led outreach. Despite overarching acceptance of transnational belonging and multi-territorial political participation, migrant electoral rights tend to be theoretically taken as separate research areas (either foreign residents or non-resident nationals), even when some hypotheses explicitly explore both units of analysis. Moreover, most studies tend to evaluate countries in the ‘Global North’. This SI brings together comparative analyses and case studies to fill in missing links that previous contributions overlook. It also aims to overcome some of the geographical bias by evaluating understudied areas mostly in the ‘Global South’ of Latin America and Africa. Half of the proposed papers focus on individual-level belonging and connection or representation with political parties; the others focus on state-level processes of historic and contemporary de jure and de facto migrant enfranchisement. The SI adds knowledge on the reasons for migrant enfranchisement, migrants’ agency in the process, and the different incentives that states and political parties face in less developed or less democratic countries, when deciding to grant rights or engage with migrants as political actors.

Please submit your paper proposals (including a title, a 250-word paper abstract, and the name, institutional affiliation of the authors) to Sebastián Umpierrez de Reguero (sumpierrezdereguero@gmail.com) and Johanna Peltoniemi (Johanna.peltoniemi@helsinki.fi) by Monday, February 7 2022.