Who Supports Metropolitan Integration? Measuring and Explaining Attitudes Towards the Political Integration of Metropolitan Areas in Western Europe

Analyzing mass opinion towards political integration and internationalization processes has become a major topic of contemporary political science, with much literature focusing on the European integration process and on attitudes towards internationalization more generally. Recent research suggests that citizens’ attitudes towards these processes hinge less on economic self-interest than on group identities and cues from political elites. However, the extent to which insights and theories from this research can be generalized to other integration contexts is unclear to date. For the context of metropolitan areas, political integration is a recurring topic of debate. While public choice scholars appreciate the existing politico-institutional fragmentation of (most) city-regions, metropolitan reformers advocate the consolidation and integration of local governments in metropolitan areas. As of now, only few studies have assessed citizens’ attitudes towards metropolitan integration. Most of them focus on attitudes towards city-county consolidation in the US context, comparative analyses from other countries are missing. We, thus, do not know i.) in how far findings for internationalization attitudes generalize to other contexts, and ii.) what attitudes citizens’ hold towards metropolitan integration outside of the US. In this paper, I address these two questions by analyzing public opinion on political integration in the metropolitan context. I first present a new measure for citizens’ attitudes towards the political integration of metropolitan areas, consisting of attitudes towards consolidation, inter-municipal cooperation, the introduction of a metropolitan government as well as inter-municipal tax-base sharing. Second, I assess the extent to which utilitarian, ideational, and cue-taking approaches matter here. The data comes from a unique population-based online-survey. 5,000 respondents from eight metropolitan areas in France, Germany, Switzerland, and the UK completed the survey in fall 2015. The empirical analysis suggests that support for metropolitan integration is contingent on political identities and ideology as well as on cues and heuristics. Respondents identifying with right-wing populist parties, those adhering to a localist ideology, and those more critical of immigrants, are strongly opposed to metropolitan integration. Moreover, citizens who are more exposed to regional issues and who trust their local officials have more favorable opinions towards metropolitan integration. By contrast, economic self-interest and pocketbook issues are not associated with metropolitan integration support. Homeowners and residents of rich municipalities, the alleged losers of metropolitan integration, do not differ in their attitudes from tenants and residents of poor municipalities. These findings indicate that citizens base their judgements on similar factors as they do when evaluating internationalization and supranational integration processes. In both situations, identity trumps pocketbook issues. The same individuals who are skeptical about supranational integration also object the political integration of metropolitan areas. For political actors advocating political integration, this implies that emphasizing the economic benefits of integration is not enough. Equally, they have to address citizens’ concerns of political self-determination and resentment towards other cultures and ethnicities if political integration is to be accepted by mass publics.