Inviting immigrants in: Field experiments in voter mobilization among immigrants in Norway

This paper reports on a randomized field experiment testing three direct mail mobilization appeals among immigrants in the 2015 Norwegian Local Elections. The three letters all included a general encouragement to vote in addition to practical information about voting. One paragraph was varied to present different mobilization messages. They were: 1) a message guaranteeing ballot secrecy. 2) a message with consistent prescriptive and descriptive norms emphasizing the importance of immigrant participation and that participation has been increasing. 3) a message with inconsistent prescriptive and descriptive norms emphasizing the importance of immigrant participation, but noting immigrant participation has been low. All three letters increased turnout among both first time voters and previously eligible voters. The effect is strongest, 5.8 percentage points, among those who were eligible to vote for the first time. Control group turnout was 20.9 percent. Among previously eligible immigrant voters there is an average treatment effect of 3.3 percentage point from a baseline of 40.2 percent turnout. In comparison to previous GOTV mail studies, these are very strong effects, far exceeding the typical response among low propensity voters. GOTV letters can therefore be an effective way to mobilize immigrant voters to participate in host country elections.