What Makes a Citizen? Contemporary Immigration and the Boundaries of Citizenry.

This article investigates how native-born Americans evaluate citizenship claims made by immigrant groups, distinguishing between legal membership (formal state citizenship) and cultural membership (being perceived as a fellow American). Using a conjoint survey experiment with a diverse sample, the study finds that legal status and age of arrival strongly influence attitudes toward legal membership, while ethnoracial factors significantly shape perceptions of cultural membership. The research reveals notable differences by respondents’ ethnoracial backgrounds: Black and Latino Americans tend to express more inclusive views toward immigrants’ citizenship claims, especially culturally, compared to White Americans. These findings underscore the multidimensional nature of citizenship and highlight the limitations of focusing solely on dominant-group perspectives to understand immigration attitudes in diverse societies.