de Athouguia Filipe, Sara, Vestin Hategekimana, Anna Marino, Carol Pierre, Didier Ruedin, Mathis Schnell, and Great Udochi

Do Spatial Political Focus, Feelings of Belonging, and Social Networks Affect the Intention to Apply for Citizenship? Evidence from Switzerland
2025

Existing research highlights instrumental factors in intentions to apply for citizenship, specifically the security of status that prevents involuntary return. Although we acknowledge the relevance of instrumental factors such as status security, we focus on the importance of soft factors of belonging as predictors of intentions to naturalize. We argue that different (political, emotional, social) forms of belonging are associated with the desire to apply for citizenship. We analyze intentions to apply for Swiss citizenship using data from the 2022 Swiss Migration-Mobility Survey (N=5,510). As predictors, we use scales on spatial political focus, generic feelings of belonging, as well as an indicator comparing friendship networks as an indicator of social networks in the country of origin and those in Switzerland. For all three, we show a substantial positive association. Individuals who are more politically focused on Switzerland, i.e. state a higher interest in the politics of the host country, and who express a stronger generic feeling of belonging have greater desires to naturalize. This also applies to people with strong friendship networks in Switzerland. These subjective factors behind naturalization intentions probably go beyond instrumental reasons and material advantages such as visa-free travel and access to social security.