Instrumentally inclusive: the political psychology of homonationalism

Turnbull-Dugarte, Stuart J. and López Ortega, Alberto (2023) Instrumentally inclusive: the political psychology of homonationalism. American Political Science Review. (doi:10.1017/S0003055423000849).

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Abstract

Can nativist attitudes condition support for LGBT+ rights? The sustained advance in pro-LGBT+ attitudes in the West often contrasts with the greening of anti-immigrant sentiment propagated by nativist supply-side actors. We argue that these parallel trends are causally connected, theorizing that exposure to sexually conservative ethnic out-groups can provoke an instrumental increase in LGBT+ inclusion, particularly among those hostile toward immigration. Leveraging experiments in Britain and Spain, we provide causal evidence that citizens strategically liberalize their levels of support for LGBT+ rights when opponents of these measures are from the ethnic out-group. In a context where sexuality-based liberalism is nationalized, increasing tolerance toward LGBT+ citizens is driven by a desire among nativist citizens to socially disidentify from those out-groups perceived as inimical to these nationalized norms. Our analyses provide a critical interpretation of positive trends in LGBT+ tolerance with instrumental liberalism masking lower rates of genuine shifts in LGBT+ inclusion

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Accepted/In Press date: 8 August 2023

e-pub ahead of print date: 13 September 2023

Additional Information: Funding Information: This research was funded by the British Academy/Leverhulme Trust (Grant No. SRG22/220985). Publisher Copyright: © The Author(s), 2023. Published by Cambridge University Press on behalf of the American Political Science Association.