Identifying and Evaluating the Impact of Policy Interventions for Increasing Citizenship Acquisition Rates in Germany

• Applicant: Dr. Giuseppe Pietrantuono
• Subject Area: Empirical Social Research ; Political Science
• Term: since 2023
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 519604192

How can governments foster immigrants’ integration into the host country’s communities? In light of a dramatic increase in their foreign populations, European governments struggle with this pressing and complex question. One highly contested policy option is to grant citizenship to already settled immigrants. Citizenship potentially fosters immigrants’ integration and leads to benefits for both local communities and the foreign-born and their families. Nonetheless, most naturalization-eligible immigrants in Europe do not apply for citizenship. Despite the potentially catalytic function of naturalization in immigrants’ integration, we lack reliable causal evidence of why immigrants choose not to naturalize and of policies specifically designed to encourage take-up. Moreover, the regional context in which immigrants live is widely neglected when explaining naturalization rates. Finally, evidence is scarce on the effects of policy changes on acquiring new citizenship and, subsequently, on immigrants’ integration. My project will close this gap by pursuing a tripartite strategy. First, it experimentally tests different policy interventions to increase naturalization rates in Germany (causes). Second, it systematically links regional determinants to naturalization rates within Germany, offering a first systematic description and analysis of how regional citizenship campaigns account for differences in citizenship acquisition rates (context). Third, it evaluates a recent reform in the German nationality law to assess the effect of naturalization on immigrants’ lives (consequences). My project’s scope is to describe and explain why naturalization rates are constantly low, how this rate can be increased, and how naturalization affects integration. Thus, the project contributes to academic and public discussions by providing empirical evidence that broadens our understanding of integration and citizenship and by generating knowledge on how to redesign naturalization policies to improve immigrants’ lives and increase social cohesion.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• International Connection: Switzerland
• Cooperation Partner: Professor Dr. Dominik Hangartner