Migrant deaths at borders and immigration attitudes: evidence from the 2013 Lampedusa shipwreck

Does exposure to migrant death alter immigration-related public opinion? Scholarship has extensively demonstrated the impact of events on attitudes toward immigrants and immigration. In doing so, however, focus has almost exclusively been placed on events that pose a direct threat to ingroup members. The authors extend this line of research to further comprehend the formative basis of the said attitudes by focusing on events that uncover the threats outgroup members are subjected to, such as migrant shipwrecks. The authors examine one of the deadliest migrant shipwrecks that have occurred in the Mediterranean Sea in recent history, the so-called 2013 Lampedusa shipwreck, in which at least 368 migrants lost their lives. Using Italian data from the European Social Survey (round 6), the authors show that in the aftermath of the event, attitudes toward immigration changed, and Italians became more willing to adopt a less restrictive immigration policy. However, attitudes toward immigrants remained unchanged: the levels of perceived ethnic threat were not altered. These findings not only expand on the prevailing understanding of the effect of salient migration events on immigration-related attitudes but also highlight the divergent formative basis of these attitudes.