Perceptions of Migration and Diversity by Local Public Administrators

Abstract

This article contributes to the recent debate on the perception of migration and diversity; it empirically examines whether public decision-makers and public administrators perceive migration and diversity as related or if they distinguish between them. It also seeks to identify the most important characteristics of respondents with positive attitudes to migration and diversity. The sample of the respondents covers Turkey, Greece, Hungary and Slovakia; those located on the “Balkan migration route” into Europe. Due to different experiences, respondents from countries with large-scale migration perceive migration and diversity differently from those in countries directly threatened by migration or countries without any direct impact of migration. Gender appears to be a statistically significant predictor in the need for high managerial skills to manage migration and diversity. Some size categories of municipalities where a respondent works appear to be statistically significant when ranking the local impacts and local economic benefits of migration.