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Online Appendix of “Welcome to the Party? Ethnicityand the Interaction between Potential Activists and
Party Gate-Keepers”
AppendicesA Additional Information on the Experimental Design 1
A.1 Experimental Design . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1A.2 Names Used . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2A.3 The E-Mails . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 3A.4 The Pre-Registered Hypotheses . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7A.5 Fieldwork . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7A.6 Coding of Outcome Variables . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 9
B Ethics Statement 15
C Additional Analyses and Extensions 15C.1 The Treatment Effect of Arabic Name Including Responses Only . . . . . . . 16C.2 The Treatment Effect of Gender . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16C.3 Do Treatment Effects of an Arabic Name Vary with the Gender of the E-mailer? 17C.4 Do Treatment Effects of Arabic Name Vary with Appeals? . . . . . . . . . . 18C.5 Do the Treatment Effects Vary by Party? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19C.6 Do the Treatment Effects Vary with the Gender and Ethnicity of the Party
Official? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 22C.7 The Share of Foreign-born among those Nominated and Elected by Party . . 23C.8 Does the Response Rate vary with the Immigrant Share in the Municipality? 24C.9 The Swedish Social Institution of ‘Fika’ and the Interaction between Potential
Activists and Party Gate-Keepers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 25
A Additional Information on the Experimental Design
In this section, we describe how the names used as aliases were selected and combined. We
also provide details on how we used the factorial design to vary the ‘appeals’ of our letters
and summarize the pre-registered hypotheses. In addition, we outline the content of our
letters used in the experiment based on the combinations of email appeal and describe the
coding of outcome variables.
A.1 Experimental Design
The experiment employs a factorial design, a design which allows us to study the main effects
of several factors using the same sample size that would be required for the study of one
independent variable without loss of statistical power. This type of design also allows for
interactions between treatments, albeit statistical power will be lower when studying such
interactions (Collins, Dziak and Li, 2009).
The experiment focuses on testing the effect of Arabic female and male aliases versus
Swedish female and male names on a) the number of party replies, and b) the tone, and c)
the information content of the replies to our emails. We randomly vary signals of gender
(Male/Female), ethnicity (Arabic name/Swedish name) as well as the types of appeals made
in the e-mails (electoral reward, policy fit, appeal to democratic norms). Taking all variables
into account, then, our study relies on a 2x2x4 factorial design.
1
A.2 Names Used
To create Arabic and Swedish aliases for our letters, we contacted Statistics Sweden (SCB).
On March 21, 2018 they provided a list of the three most common first and last names in
Swedish and Arabic from the Swedish population registry. By combining first and last name
in pairs we created 9 unique name-combinations for each ethnicity and gender, yielding a
total of 36 aliases. The names are provided below.
Table A.1: Arabic female and male first names
Ethnicity Gender First nameArabic female SaraArabic female ZainabArabic female NoorArabic male AliArabic male MohammedArabic male Ahmed
Table A.2: Arabic last names
Hussein Ibrahim Hassan
Table A.3: Swedish female and male first names
Ethnicity Gender First nameSwedish female AnnaSwedish female EvaSwedish female MariaSwedish male LarsSwedish male MikaelSwedish male Anders
Table A.4: Swedish last names
Andersson Johansson Karlsson
2
Table A.5: Factorial design for Appeals
Electoral in-centives
No No No No Yes Yes Yes Yes
Policy fit No No Yes Yes No No Yes YesNormativedemocracyappeal
No(1) Yes(5) No(3) Yes(6) No(2) Yes(7) No(4) Yes(8)
A.3 The E-Mails
We first drafted a standard e-mail (see Figure A.1), to be sent out to party officials. However,
using a factorial design (see Table A.5), we also examine the effects of three different types
appeals: electoral incentives, policy fit, and normative democracy appeal. With respect
to the types of appeals, our design gives us three variables that vary (Electoral incentives
Yes/No, Policy fit Yes/No, Normative Yes/No), and we therefore have eight types of letters
in all including the neutral one. In Figures A.1 to A.8, we give examples of letters. Each
one of the 8 types of letters makes up 1/8 of the universe of letters.
Apart from the appeal(s) in each e-mail, the only experimental variation is in the name
of the sender for each respective treatment. To lessen the risk of detection by the political
parties, therefore, some of the sentences for each treatment have been varied in their wording,
though the content remains the same. The variations in wording gives us a total of 324
combinations of sentences for our 8 different letters.
3
Hej!
Hur går man till väga för att bli medlem i [partinamn]? Hur ofta träffas ni?Finns det något sätt för mig att bidra till arbetet med kampanjen inför valet nutill hösten?
Mvh[e-post avsändarens namn]
Figure A.1: Example of neutral email sent to the political parties (Swedish)
Hello!
How does one go about becoming a member of [party name]? How often do youmeet? Is there any way for me to contribute to the campaign for the electionnow this fall?
Best[e-mailer name]
Figure A.2: Example of neutral email sent to the political parties (English)
Hej!
Många av mina vänner funderar på att rösta på [partinamn] ochjag funderar på att göra detsamma. Hur går det till att bli medlem i[partinamn]? Träffas ni ofta? Kan jag på något sätt bidra till kampanjen införvalet 2018?
Mvh[e-post avsändarens namn]
Figure A.3: Example of neutral + electoral incentives email sent to the political parties(Swedish). The letter conveys an inclination to vote for the party
4
Hello!
Many of my friends are thinking of voting for [party name] and I’mthinking about doing the same. How does it work to become a memberof [party name]? How often do you meet? Can I in any way contribute to thecampaign for the election 2018?
Best[e-mailer name]
Figure A.4: Example of neutral + electoral incentives email sent to the political parties(English). The letter conveys an inclination to vote for the party
Hej!
Jag gillar sedan länge [partinamns] politik och skulle vilja engageramig i att föra ut den. Vad behöver jag göra för att bli medlem i [partinamn]?Hur ofta träffas ni? Kan jag på något sätt bidra till kampanjen inför valet 2018?
Mvh[e-post avsändarens namn]
Figure A.5: Example of neutral + policy fit email sent to the political parties (Swedish).The letter conveys a strong liking of the party’s politics
Hello!
I have long liked [party name’s] politics and would like to engage inbringing it out. What do I need to do to become a member of [party name]?How often do you meet? Can I in any way contribute to the campaign for the2018 election?
Best[e-mailer name]
Figure A.6: Example of neutral + policy fit email sent to the political parties (English).The letter conveys a strong liking of the party’s politics
5
Hej!
Jag tycker att det är väldigt viktigt att alla människor i samhälletengagerar sig politiskt för en hälsosam demokrati. Vad behöver jag göraför att bli medlem i [partinamn]? Träffas ni ibland, och i så fall hur ofta? Kanjag på något sätt bidra till kampanjen inför valet 2018?
Mvh[e-post avsändarens namn]
Figure A.7: Example of neutral + normative democracy appeal email sent to the politicalparties (Swedish). The letter conveys a strong stance on the importance of everyone engagingin politics for a healthy democracy
Hello!
I think it is very important that all people in society committhemselves politically for a healthy democracy. What do I needto do to become a member of [party name]? Do you meet sometimes, and ifso, how often? Can I in any way contribute to the campaign for the 2018 election?
Best[e-mailer name]
Figure A.8: Example of neutral + normative democracy appeal email sent to the po-litical parties (English). The letter conveys a strong stance on the importance of everyoneengaging in politics for a healthy democracy
6
A.4 The Pre-Registered Hypotheses
Our study has been registered prior to realization of outcomes in the Evidence in Governance
and Politics (EGAP) registry on June 11, 2018 and was gated (while data collection was
ongoing) until September 10, 2018 (EGAP ID: 20180611AB).
A.5 Fieldwork
We sent one e-mail to each local branch of the eight political parties represented in the
Swedish parliament, which are the Social Democrats (S), the Moderate Party (M), the Swe-
den Democrats (SD), the Greens (MP), the Center Party (C), the Left Party (V), the Liberals
(L) and the Christian Democrats (KD). These local branches are located in one of the 290
municipalities of Sweden. In total, we collected 2,104 e-mail addresses to party officials in
local branches using the parties’ web-pages. To send out the emails we created 36 gmail-
accounts holding the first and last name of our respective aliases followed by a combination
of the numbers 123 and @gmail.com.1 We sent only one (randomly selected) e-mail to each
local party branch official because, first, we wanted to minimize the risk of detection and,
second, we worried about ethical implications. In particular, we did not want the party
officials to spend more time than necessary answering fictitious e-mails and we did not want
them to overestimate the local support of their party.
On June 18, 2018 we distributed 1,917 emails directly via our gmail-accounts and an
additional 187 emails via contact forms on local party web-pages. Out of the 2,104 emails we1Example of email adress: [email protected].
7
sent out 92 bounced (coded as missing), which left us with 2,012 emails to expect possible
responses from. We then collected responses to our emails with regular intervals. After
August 19, 2018, we did not receive any additional e-mails until we ended our fieldwork on
Election Day (September 9, 2018). After receiving a response e-mail we registered it and
responded with a short reply explaining that our alias had realized that she/he would not
have time to get engaged at the present moment because of responsibilities at home and
at work (see Figures A.9 and A.10). All in all, we coded 1,270 e-mails as actual unique
responses to our aliases original emails, which gives a response rate of 60.1 percent for the
2,104 emails that we originally distributed and 63.1 percent for the 2,012 e-mails that did
not bounce.
Hej!
Tack för svar. Jag har dock insett att jag inte hinner med att engagera mig inuläget, eftersom jag har små barn och dessutom har mycket på jobbet. Fastjag vill gärna engagera mig längre fram om jag får mer tid över.
Med vänlig hälsning,[e-post avsändarens namn]
Figure A.9: Example of reply e-mail sent to the political parties’ response e-mails (Swedish).The letter is intended to minimize potential negative effects on party officials of not receivingany response to their replies
8
Hello!
Thanks for the reply. However, I have realized that I currently do not havetime to get involved, because I have small children and also have a lot at work.Nevertheless, I would like to get involved later if I get more time over.
Best regards,[e-mailer name]
Figure A.10: Example of reply e-mail sent to the political parties’ response e-mails (English).The letter is intended to minimize potential negative effects on party officials of not receivingany response to their replies
A.6 Coding of Outcome Variables
To be able to categorize the response emails, we developed a coding scheme. The first version
of this scheme was tested by coding 100 randomly selected emails in a double-blind parallel
process. This was done by the two authors. After the coding was completed, the results
were compared. Initially the average inter-coder reliability rate was 87,1 per cent, where the
lowest rate for a single variable was 65 per cent and the highest was 100 per cent. To improve
the clarity of interpretation of the scheme, the discrepancies were discussed and the coding
scheme up-dated. Thereafter 100 new emails were randomly selected and the double-blind
parallel coding process repeated. This time, the average inter-coder reliability rate was 91,5
per cent, with a lowest agreement rate for a single variable of 82 per cent and the highest
still at 100 per cent. This was deemed satisfactory, and the resultant coding scheme is shown
in Table A.6.
We have coded eight outcomes in total. First, we have coded whether our alias receives a
reply. Second, and in order to measure how informative the response was, we have counted
9
Table A.6: Final Coding Scheme
Outcome Code Interpretation Guide for Coding of Email1 Re-sponse
Yes/No Any non-bounce back e-mail sent from the party’s account.
2 # ofWords
Number Word count of the response.
3 An-swersQues-tions
All=2,Some=1,No=0
Were any of the questions in the email answered? For questionssee the letters.
4 Ad-ditionalInforma-tion
Yes/No Does the party representative give more information than askedfor? Coded as Yes only if the information is NOT topically re-lated to any of our 3 questions. Example: additional contactinformation such as Facebook, attached party program, infor-mation on how to obtain representative assignments followingthe election, what such assignments entail, or where the partyfacilities are located etc.
5 UsesName
Yes/No Is the communication made more personal by the use of thealias’ first name?
6 Wel-comesE-mail
Yes/No Is our alias welcomed to the party? The word welcome is eitherspecifically used, or the alias receive some kind of praise orpositive confirmation for making a contact. Example: "Thankyou for your email", or "How nice of you to contact us", or "Icompletely agree that..." etc.
7 FuturePartyContact
Yes/No Does the party representative invite for any further contact withthe party? Example: indicates dates and times for generalmeetings and activities. Coded as Yes only if it is clear thatour alias is welcome to these meetings, and/or if the meetingsare open to everyone. Also, only coded as Yes if it is possibleto identify when and where the meetings are taking place, andif it is clear that several party members will appear, or if ouralias is invited to visit the local party office. Otherwise No.
8 FuturePersonalContact
Yes/No Does our alias receive a personal offer to help? Coded as willingto meet in person, to talk on the phone, email further, or ageneral offer to follow-up. Only coded as Yes if it concernsfuture contact with the representative in question, otherwisesee Party Contact (7). However, variables 7 and 8 are notnecessary mutually exclusive. Example: If the representativewrites "on Thursday we have a square meeting at .... pleasedrop by to meet with us. I will be there. ", then both 7 and8 are coded as Yes. Questions such as "what policy questionsare you most interested in?", or "Have you ever been politicallyactive before?", are are coded as Yes. However, questions thatonly state "where do you live", or if contact is offered only afterpayment of the party membership fee, are coded as No.
10
Table A.7: Descriptives for Outcome Variablesof Study
Outcome: Mean Std Dev.Response 0.581 0.494Information:# of Words 50.340 71.439Answers Questions 0.465 0.499Additional Information 0.179 0.383
Tone:Uses Name 0.356 0.479Welcomes E-mail 0.493 0.500Future Party Contact 0.165 0.371Future Personal Contact 0.307 0.461
Note: N = 2, 012. To avoid post-treatment bias, e-mailsthat received no reply were coded as 0 for all outcomesvariables.
the number of words in the response, and coded whether it answers any of our alias’ questions,
or provides additional information. Third, to capture how welcoming party officials were in
their responses, we coded whether they used the name of our alias in the response, whether
they welcome our alias, and whether they invite our alias to party activities or suggest a
personal meeting in the future. To avoid post-treatment bias (Montgomery, Nyhan and
Torres, 2018), we have coded non-responses as zero rather than missing (Coppock, 2019).
The descriptive statistics for the outcome variables are presented in Table A.7.
Below we present two examples of responses to our letters and how we have coded them.
The letters have been selected because they respectively hold the least and the most number
of words of all collected responses. As can be seen below, the first response is very short
and uninformative. By contrast, the second letter is long and quite informative. We have
removed information that could be used to identify the party official.
11
Vi står på torget nu på torsdag 10.00-12-00 kom och besök oss
Hälsningar XXXXX XXXXXXXXSD XXXXX
Figure A.11: Example of short response e-mail. The response is to a Neutral (1) letter fromour Swedish alias: Mikael Johansson. In line with our Coding Scheme (Table A.6) we codedthe eight outcome variables in this specific response as follows: 1(Yes), 2(12), 3(0), 4(0),5(0), 6(1), 7(0), 8(0).
We are at the town square this Thursday 10.00-12-00 come visit us
Regards XXXXX XXXXXXXXSD XXXXX
Figure A.12: Example of a short response e-mail (English). The response is to a Neutral(1) letter from our Swedish alias: Mikael Johansson. In line with our Coding Scheme (TableA.6) we coded the eight outcome variables in this specific response as follows: 1(Yes), 2(12),3(0), 4(0), 5(0), 6(1), 7(0), 8(0).
12
Hej Noor
Så himla trevligt, vi är jätteglada för alla som vill vara med och driva politiken för ett jämlikt och solidarisktsamhälle!
Det brukar gå smidigt att bli medlem via den centrala hemsidan https://www.socialdemokraterna.se/bli-medlem/ där kan man fylla i uppgifterna direkt själv samt välja hur man vill betala medlemsavgiften.Medlemsavgiften blir en klumpsumma (240kr) men den betalas bara en gång per år och går till saker somutdelningsmaterial, kaffe och fika som man sedan får gratis på till exempel Fika & (S)nack. Annars kan duom du känner en medlem be dom lägga till dig i "Sappen" (Socialdemokraternas app-verktyg)eller skickamig För och Efternamn, personnummer, adress, telefonnr. och e-postadress. Så det är samma uppgiftersom finns att fylla i via hemsidan.
När det gäller träffar finns lite olika:
Medlemsmöte - öppet möte för alla medlemmar. Där ges lite rapport från vad som händer i kommunen,kanske en kort föreläsning eller lite frågor att samtala om. Dom är den sista tisdagen i månaden medundantag för Juli och December.
Fika & (S)nack som är för medlemmar och ickemedlemmar där man fördjupar sig i ett ämne. Undervåren har dom haft rubriker som t. ex. Akutsjukvarden och primarvarden, Normer och varderingar eller"skolutveckling". I höst är tanken att det kommer vara ett Fika & (S)nack per vecka.
Inom Socialdemokraterna i Nassjo finns det även små föreningar, Syd-Ostra, Nord-Ostra och Aker, det finnsockså en aktiv förening i Bodafors och sidoföreningarna SSU och Tro & Solidaritet. Där har man störreutrymme att prata på ett personligt plan.
Alla som har tid och vilja är välkomna att hjälpa till i de så kallade "Utåtriktade" aktiviteterna: Marknader,Långlördagar, torsdagscafé, affischering, bygge av valstuga, kaffeutdelning på stationen eller dörrknackning.Där vi försöker informera om vad Socialdemokraterna står för och lyssna på vad människor känner ochtycker.
Det finns också utrymme att träffas och bara umgås, i fredags var det ca 5-8 som träffades på After Work,några var med som ett lag på Jubeljoggen och i påskas hade vi knytkalas hos en medlem.
Inga av mötena är obligatoriska utan när man kan och vill. Utöver dessa finns grupper för förtroendevaldasom styrelsen, verkställande utskottet m.m
Så till sista frågan, där har vi 3 som jobbar speciellt med att samordna valkampanjen "valledarna". Omdu vill så kan jag skicka din e-post eller telefonnummer till dom så att dom kontaktar dig eller skicka digderas? Vill du så lägger jag till dig i e-postutskicken, där det kommer info om träffar och aktiviteter.
Nästa som är på gång är 21/6 Torsdagscafé kl.10-12, då har vi två som delar ut cafébiljetter på torgetoch två som är inne på S-planaden (vår partilokal som ligger på Esplanaden 2A, mitt emot Thimons) somsamtalar och fikar med de som kommer in. Sen är det långlördag 30/6 mellan kl.10-14 man kan välja attgå till exempel mellan 10-12 eller 12-14.
I Juli är det lite sommaruppehåll men det drar fort igång i Augusti igen. Jag hoppas att du inte blirförskräckt av all denna text och hör gärna av dig om du har fler frågor.
Vänliga Hälsningar XXXX
Figure A.13: Example of long response mail (Swedish). The response is to a Neu-tral+Electoral Incentives+Policy fit (4) letter from our Arabic alias: Noor Ibrahim. In linewith our Coding Scheme (Table A.6) we coded the eight outcome variables in this specificresponse as follows: 1(Yes), 2(513), 3(2), 4(1), 5(1), 6(1), 7(1), 8(1).
13
Hi Noor
That is so very nice, we are very happy for everyone who wants to join us and strive towards an equal andsolidary society!
It is usually easiest to become a member via the central website https://www.socialdemokraterna.se/bli-medlem/ where you can fill in the information directly yourself and choose how you want to pay themembership fee. The membership fee is a lump sum (SEK 240) but it is only paid once a year and goes tothings like campaign leaflets, fika and coffee, which you then get for free at, for example, Chat & (S)nacks.In case you know a member, you can ask them to add you to the "Sappen" (Social Democrats app tool)or send me your first name and surname, social security number, address, telephone number, and emailaddress. It is the same information that need to be filled out on the website.
When it comes to meetings, there are several options:
Member meetings - open meetings for all members. At those you will receive information on what ishappening in the municipality, maybe a short lecture or some questions to talk about. These meetings takeplace on the last Tuesday of the month with the exception of July and December.
Chat & (S)nacks, which is for members and non-members, where we immerse ourselves in a subject. Duringthe spring these meetings had headlines such as. "Emergency care and primary care", "Norms and values"or "school development". This fall, the idea is that there will be one Chat & (S)nacks per week.
Among the Social Democrats in Nassjo there are also small associations, South-East, North-East and Aker,there is also an active association in Bodafors and the side associations SSU and Faith & Solidarity. Thereyou have more room to talk on a personal level.
Everyone who wants to and has the time is welcome to help in the so-called ‘external’ activities: Markets,Long Saturdays, Thursday café, putting up posters, construction of an election hall, coffee distribution atthe station or door-to-door canvassing. Where we try to inform about what the Social Democrats stand forand listen to what people know and think.
It is also possible to meet and just hang out, last Friday about 5-8 of us met for an After Work, someparticipated as a team at the Jubelrun and at Easter we had a potluck party at a member’s house.
None of the meetings are mandatory, you attend when you can and want to. In addition, there are groupsfor elected representatives such as the Board of Directors, the Executive Committee and others.
So to the last question, we have 3 who work especially with coordinating the election campaign "electoralleaders". If you want to, I can send them your email or phone number so that they contact you or may sendyou their contact information? If you want, I add you to the e-mail list, where we distribute info aboutmeetings and activities.
Next up, on June 21, is the Thursday café at 10-12, where we have two people who hand out cafe tickets inthe town square and two others that are inside the S-plane (our party headquarter which is on Esplanaden2A, opposite Thimons) talking and having fun with those who come in. Then it is long Saturday on June30, between 10-14 pm you can choose to go for example between 10-12 or 12-14.
In July it is summer break but it soon starts in August again. I hope you are not frightened by all this textand I would love to hear from you if you have more questions.
Kind Regards XXXX
Figure A.14: Example of long response e-mail (English). The response is to a Neu-tral+Electoral Incentives+Policy fit (4) letter from our Arabic alias: Noor Ibrahim. In linewith our Coding Scheme (Table A.6) we coded the eight outcome variables in this specificresponse as follows: 1(Yes), 2(513), 3(2), 4(1), 5(1), 6(1), 7(1), 8(1).
14
B Ethics Statement
This research was approved by the Regional Ethical Review Board in Stockholm on February
15, 2018 (see approval number 2018/165-31/5). The research reported herein involves human
subjects. Consent from participants was not obtained as this would undermine the credibility
of the study. In light of this, it is important to consider the expected benefits from our study
to our study population (i.e. political parties) as well as politically marginalized groups
in society, such as ethnic minorities (cf. Teele, 2014). Even if there are obvious societal
benefits from this study, steps were undertaken to minimize possible negative effects on the
local party organizations. In particular, we kept the e-mails short so that officials would not
need to spend excessive time on reading them. Moreover, we only sent one e-mail to each
party official, so as to bring down the amount work for them, and so as to not affect their
perception of party support and the supply of potential party activists.
Moreover, to protect the integrity of the research subjects, the experimental data set has
been anonymized by the authors. While no individual names were saved, a data set that
contains the names of the included local party branches and their e-mail address is kept by
the author in a separate encrypted file on a password protected server. Moreover, the results
are presented in the aggregate, which makes it impossible to identify any single individual.
C Additional Analyses and Extensions
In this section, we perform additional analyses and extensions of the other treatments in-
cluded in the experiment, as well as interactions between our main treatment of interest
15
(Swedish versus Arabic name) and a number of other factors.
C.1 The Treatment Effect of Arabic Name Including Responses
Only
As described in the main paper, when analyzing the informativeness and tone of the re-
sponses, we have coded non-responses as zero rather than missing, because doing otherwise
would be tantamount to conditioning on a post-treatment variable and thereby inducing se-
lection bias. As a robustness check, we performed the same analysis, this time only including
actual responses. The results are in Table C.8 and are very similar to those presented in the
main paper: Arabic aliases receive less informative replies and the tone of those replies are,
with two exceptions, significantly less welcoming.
C.2 The Treatment Effect of Gender
As described in Appendix A, one of the pre-registered hypotheses stated that female aliases
would receive fewer and less informative replies with a less positive tone. As can be seen in
Table C.9, however, there are no statistically significant treatment effects of gender on any
of the eight outcome variables.
16
Table C.8: Treatment Effects of Arabic Name byDependent Variable (Responses Only)
Outcome: Treatment Effect:Information:# of Words -10.59∗∗
(4.57)Answers Questions -.056∗∗
(.026)Additional Information -.062∗∗
(.03)Tone:Uses Name -.101∗∗∗
(.031)Welcomes E-mail .004
(.024)Future Party Contact -.042
(.029)Future Personal Contact -.07∗∗
(.034)
Note: N = 1, 168. Entries are OLS-coefficients fromregressions controlling for the types of appeals (electoral,policy and normative) included in the email, the party ofthe recipient and the municipality of local party branch.Robust standard errors in parentheses. ∗ p < 0.10, ∗∗
p < 0.05, ∗∗∗ p < 0.01.
C.3 Do Treatment Effects of an Arabic Name Vary with the Gen-
der of the E-mailer?
As can be seen in Table C.10, there is suggestive evidence that the discriminatory effect
against individuals with Arabic names is somewhat stronger for female aliases. However,
these interaction effects are, by design, less precisely estimated than the main effect and are
only statistically significant for two of the eight studied outcomes.
17
Table C.9: Treatment Effects of Gender by De-pendent Variable
Outcome: Treatment Effect:Response .006
(.023)Information:# of Words -2.12
(3.24)Answers Questions .011
(.023)Additional Information -.027
(.018)Tone:Uses Name -.011
(.022)Welcomes E-mail .008
(.024)Future Party Contact -.027
(.018)Future Personal Contact .028
(.022)
Note: N = 2, 012. Entries are OLS-coefficients fromregressions controlling for the types of appeals (electoral,policy and normative) included in the email, the party ofthe recipient and the municipality of local party branch.Robust standard errors in parentheses. ∗ p < 0.10, ∗∗
p < 0.05, ∗∗∗ p < 0.01.
C.4 Do Treatment Effects of Arabic Name Vary with Appeals?
We also analyze whether potential activists with an immigrant background can increase the
responsiveness of party officials by appealing to potential electoral gain, common ideological
ground or norms of democratic inclusion. As can be seen in Table C.11, we find few effects.
Irrespective of the type of appeal, results remain largely the same in that officials are less
likely to respond, and give less informative answers that use a less warm and welcoming tone
18
Table C.10: Treatment Effects of Arabic Name by Gender andDependent Variable
Treatment Effect:Outcome: Man Woman Diff.Response -.059∗ -.088∗∗∗ -.028
(.033) (.033) (.047)Information:# of Words -8.3∗ -13.478∗∗∗ -5.176
(4.49) (5.221) (7.076)Answers Question -.093∗∗∗ -.102∗∗∗ -.009
(.034) (.034) (.048)Additional Information -.041 -.072∗∗∗ -.031
(.027) (.026) (.038)Tone:Uses Name -.055∗ -.151∗∗∗ -.096∗∗
(.033) (.032) (.046)Welcomes E-mail -.027 -.105∗∗∗ -.079
(.034) (.034) (.048)Future Party Contacts -.034 -.036 -.002
(.027) (.025) (.037)Future Personal Contacts -.034 -.119∗∗∗ -.085∗
(.031) (.032) (.044)
Note: N = 2, 012. Entries are OLS-coefficients from regressions control-ling for the types of appeals (electoral, policy and normative) included inthe email, the party of the recipient and the municipality of local partybranch. Robust standard errors in parentheses. ∗ p < 0.10, ∗∗ p < 0.05,∗∗∗ p < 0.01.
when they are being contacted by an individual with an Arabic name.
C.5 Do the Treatment Effects Vary by Party?
In Table C.12, we analyze whether discrimination against Arabic aliases varies with partisan-
ship. As can be seen, it is officials from parties on the right of the political spectrum, more
than those on the left, that give preferential treatment to potential activists with Swedish
19
Table C.11: Treatment Effects of Arabic Name by Type of Appealand Dependent Variable
Outcome: Treatment Effect:
No Appeal Electoral Policy Normative
Response -.128∗∗∗ -.059 -.12∗∗ -.097∗∗
(.046) (.047) (.047) (.046)Information:# of Words -12.716∗∗ -16.923∗∗ -12.261∗∗ -5.254
(6.292) (7.037) (6.217) (7.022)Answers Question -.115∗∗ -.105∗∗ -.118∗∗ -.086∗
(.047) (.047) (.048) (.048)Additional Information -.05 -.072∗ -.033 -.057
(.037) (.037) (.036) (.037)Tone:Uses Name -.119∗∗∗ -.136∗∗∗ -.159∗∗∗ -.03
(.045) (.046) (.045) (.046)Welcomes E-Mail -.075 -.057 -.065 -.087∗
(.047) (.048) (.048) (.048)Future Party Contacts -.031 .025 -.079∗∗ -.048
(.036) (.036) (.035) (.035)Future Personal Contact -.056 -.034 -.119∗∗∗ -.055
(.044) (.044) (.044) (.044)
Note: N = 2, 012. Entries are OLS-coefficients from regressions controllingfor the types of appeals (electoral, policy and normative) included in the email,the party of the recipient and the municipality of local party branch. Robuststandard errors in parentheses. ∗ p < 0.10, ∗∗ p < 0.05, ∗∗∗ p < 0.01.
names. For most, but not all, outcomes, the largest differences are between officials from the
radical right party (SD) and the left party (V). For instance, whereas Arabic and Swedish
aliases have a roughly equal chance of getting a reply from an official of V, Arabic aliases’
chance of receiving a reply, when contacting SD, is 21%-points lower than that of an alias
with a Swedish name. But as can also be seen, there are important difference between the
two largest parties in Sweden — the Social Democrats (S) and the Conservatives (M) — as
well. For example, the frequency with which a Conservative answers any of the questions
posed by a Arabic alias is 26.5%-points lower than when the alias has a Swedish name. The
corresponding figure for the Social Democrats is only 3%-points.
20
TableC.12:
Treatm
entEff
ects
ofArabicNam
eby
Partyan
dDep
endent
Varia
ble
Treatm
entEffe
ct:
Outcomes:
VS
MP
LC
KD
MSD
LargestDiff.
Diff.MainParties
Respo
nse
.009
-.039
-.028
-.023
-.049
-.068
-.197
∗∗∗
-.207
∗∗∗
SD-V
-.216
∗∗M-S
-.158
∗
(.06
7)(.06
2)(.06)
(.074)
(.065)
(.072)
(.062)
(.069)
(.096)
(.087)
Info
rmat
ion:
Words
6.32
8-12.61
8-14.82
∗-16.477
1.929
-9.381
-18.123∗
∗-27.113∗
∗∗SD
-V-33.441∗
∗M-S
-5.505
(14.88
3)(9.186
)(7.646)
(10.08)
(7.962)
(9.188)
(9.103)
(8.349)
(16.1)
(12.749)
AnswersQuestion
.028
-.032
-.065
-.107
-.041
-.102
-.265
∗∗∗
-.221
∗∗∗
M-V
-.292
∗∗∗
M-S
-.233
∗∗
(.06
6)(.06
7)(.061)
(.074)
(.064)
(.073)
(.067)
(.067)
(.095)
(.094)
Add
itiona
lInformation
.047
-.055
-.048
-.086
-.013
-.036
-.12∗
∗-.1
59∗∗
∗SD
-V-.2
06∗∗
∗M-S
-.064
(.05
3)(.05
8)(.048)
(.053)
(.044)
(.051)
(.054)
(.05)
(.073)
(.08)
Tone
:UsesNam
e-.0
42-.0
49-.0
66-.0
34-.0
68-.1
69∗∗
-.203
∗∗∗
-.215
∗∗∗
SD-V
-.173
∗M-S
-.155
∗
(.06
1)(.06
5)(.06)
(.069)
(.058)
(.067)
(.063)
(.068)
(.091)
(.09)
Welcomes
E-M
ail
.026
-.033
-.02
-.054
-.023
-.084
-.23∗
∗∗-.1
36∗
M-V
-.256
∗∗∗
M-S
-.197
∗∗
(.06
7)(.06
4)(.062)
(.073)
(.064)
(.073)
(.064)
(.071)
(.093)
(.09)
Future
Party
Con
tacts
.021
-.068
.023
-.043
-.024
.044
-.171
∗∗∗
-.067
M-K
D-.2
14∗∗
∗M-S
-.103
(.05
5)(.05
7)(.042)
(.058)
(.038)
(.052)
(.053)
(.047)
(.075)
(.078)
Future
Persona
lCon
tacts
-.044
-.074
-.002
-.001
-.095
-.09
-.125
∗∗-.1
92∗∗
∗SD
-MP
-.19∗
∗M-S
-.052
(.05
6)(.06
4)(.059)
(.069)
(.059)
(.067)
(.062)
(.062)
(.084)
(.089)
Not
e:N
=2,
012.
EntriesareOLS
-coefficients
from
regressio
nscontrolling
forthegend
erof
thee-mailer,
thetype
sof
appe
als(electoral,
polic
yan
dno
rmative)
includ
edin
theem
aila
ndthemun
icipality
oflocalp
arty
bran
ch.Rob
uststan
dard
errors
inpa
renthe
ses.
∗p
<0.
10,
∗∗p
<0.
05,
∗∗∗
p<
0.01
.V=The
Left
Party,
S=The
Social
Dem
ocrats,MP=
The
Green
s,L=
The
Libe
rals,
C=The
AgrarianPa
rty,
KD=The
Christ
ianDem
ocrats,M
=The
Con
servatives,S
D=The
Swed
enDem
ocrats.La
rgestDiff.show
sthediffe
renc
ebe
tweenthemost
andtheleastne
gativ
eeff
ect.
Diff.MainPa
rtiesshow
sthediffe
renc
ebe
tweentheeff
ectforthemainrig
htpa
rty(M
)an
dthat
ofthemain
left
party(S).
21
C.6 Do the Treatment Effects Vary with the Gender and Ethnicity
of the Party Official?
While we do not have access to the gender and ethnicity of the party official, we have
coded the responses received according to whether the party official had a female-sounding
first name and Nordic-sounding last name. Since we can only code actual responses (as
opposed to non-response), the analyses conditioning on whether the party official has a
female-sounding first name and Nordic-sounding last name will rely on a smaller number of
observations and may be subject to post-treatment bias (see, e.g., Montgomery, Nyhan and
Torres, 2018). 40.2% of the responses were coded as coming from party official that had a
female-sounding first name and 90.4% from one with a Nordic-sounding last name.
Beginning with the results for the gender of the party official, these results are in Table
C.13. As can be seen, the treatment effects of an Arabic name do not differ significantly
between officials that have a female- and male-sounding name. Turning to the ethnicity of the
official, there is some suggestive evidence that party officials with Nordic names respond less
favorably to Arabic aliases. In particular, officials with Nordic-sounding names are notably
less likely to answer questions posed by e-mailers with Arabic names. Due in all likelihood
to the reduction in sample size when only analyzing responses, and the small number of
officials with Non-Nordic names, this difference is not statistically significant at any of the
conventional levels. And while officials with Nordic-sounding names treat e-mailers with
Swedish-sounding names preferentially when it comes to invitations to personal meetings,
officials with Non-Nordic names do not.
22
Table C.13: Treatment Effects of Arabic Name by the Gender of theParty Official
Treatment Effect:Outcome: Male Name Female Name Diff.Information:# of Words -2.17 -15.134∗∗ -12.968
(5.41) (7.05) (9.212)Answers Question -.04 -.04 -.001
(.034) (.042) (.055)Additional Information -.039 -.082 -.043
(.039) (.052) (.066)Tone:Uses Name -.097∗∗ -.098∗ -.001
(.042) (.051) (.067)Welcomes E-mail -.015 .035 .05
(.033) (.036) (.05)Future Party Contacts -.048 -.039 .01
(.038) (.05) (.065)Future Personal Contacts -.017 -.122∗∗ -.105
(.044) (.056) (.072)
Note: N = 1, 141. Entries are OLS-coefficients from regressions controlling forthe gender of the e-mailer, the types of appeals (electoral, policy and normative)included in the e-mail, the party of the recipient and the municipality of localparty branch. Robust standard errors in parentheses. ∗ p < 0.10, ∗∗ p < 0.05, ∗∗∗
p < 0.01.
C.7 The Share of Foreign-born among those Nominated and Elected
by Party
Table C.15 shows the share of foreign born among those nominated and elected for each
party. As can be seen, parties belonging to the traditional right (the Conservatives, the
Centre Party, The Liberals and the Christian Democrats) and the radical right (the Swe-
den Democrats) have considerably lower shares of foreign-born politicians than do parties
belonging to the left (the Social Democrats, the Left Party and The Greens).
23
Table C.14: Treatment Effects of Arabic Name by the Ethnicity of the PartyOfficial
Treatment EffectOutcome: Non-Nordic Name Nordic Name Diff.Information:# of Words -16.27 -5.071 11.199
(13.18) (4.724) (14.264)Answers Question .097 -.061∗∗ -.158
(.092) (.028) (.097)Additional Information -.104 -.049 .056
(.095) (.034) (.102)Tone:Uses Name .018 -.122∗∗∗ -.141
(.096) (.035) (.103)Welcomes E-mail .091 -.015 -.106
(.071) (.026) (.075)Future Party Contacts -.249∗∗ -.026 .223∗∗
(.101) (.033) (.108)Future Personal Contacts .246∗∗ -.095∗∗ -.341∗∗∗
(.104) (.038) (.111)
Note: N = 1, 088. Entries are OLS-coefficients from regressions controlling for the genderof the e-mailer, the types of appeals (electoral, policy and normative) included in the e-mail, the party of the recipient and the municipality of local party branch. Robust standarderrors in parentheses. ∗ p < 0.10, ∗∗ p < 0.05, ∗∗∗ p < 0.01.
C.8 Does the Response Rate vary with the Immigrant Share in
the Municipality?
As an additional check, we have performed a new analysis where we estimate whether the
discrimination rate against Arabic aliases is larger when they contact party branches in
municipalities where few immigrants live. In it, we focus on the share of immigrants in the
municipality since data on the share of immigrants, or ‘second-generation immigrants’ from
the MENA region is not available.
24
Table C.15: Foreign-born as a %-share of Elected (Nominated)by party, 2014
%-share of Elected (Nominated):The Sweden Democrats 7.0 (7.2)The Conservatives 5.8 (8.2)The Centre Party 3.0 (4.6)The Liberal Party 6.9 (9.0)The Christian Democrats 6.0 (10.6)The Green Party 14.7 (14.3)The Social Democrats 9.1 (10.9)The Left Party 11.6 (13.8)
Note: Entries are the percentage share of foreign-born as a share amongthe elected by party and year. Entries in parentheses are the share offoreign-born among the nominated by party and year. Figures are fromStatistics Sweden.
As can be seen in Figure C.15, the treatment effect is smaller when we contact party
branches located in municipalities with more immigrants. However, it is also clear that for
the vast majority of municipalities, the treatment effect is significant and negative and for
no municipalities is it significantly positive. In other words, the municipality has to have a
very large immigrant population for the discriminatory effect against Arabic aliases to be
absent.
C.9 The Swedish Social Institution of ‘Fika’ and the Interaction
between Potential Activists and Party Gate-Keepers
The concept of ‘fika’ denotes the activity of meeting up to have coffee and/or pastries for
social purposes. In the words of McLean and Syed (2015), “Fika is a Swedish cultural
practice, which is meant to be a time to take a pause from the daily grind and maintain
25
−.3
−.2
−.1
.2.1
0.1
.2.3
.4.5
Marg
inal tr
eatm
ent effect of A
rabic
nam
e
05
10
15
20
25
30
35
40
Fre
quency
0 .1 .2 .3 .4 .5
Immigrant share in municipality
Note: Bars show the frequency of observations for different levels of the variable measuring the share ofimmigrants in the municipality.
Figure C.15: Marginal treatment effect of Arabic name on the response rate conditional onthe share of immigrants in the municipality (with 95% confidence interval)
social connection with others.” (6) The Swedish institution of ‘fika’ is thus steeped in socio-
cultural significance, and has been suggested to have considerable potential to further the
social integration of immigrants and natives (de Quadros and Vu, 2017).
While coding the replies, we noticed that quite many of them spontaneously invited the
e-mailer to have ‘fika’ (almost one in ten of the responses included such an invitation). Given
the potential importance of ‘fika’ to the integration of immigrants and natives, we decided to
code whether the responses include an invitation to have ‘fika’; more specifically, we coded
26
Table C.16: Treatment Ef-fect of Arabic Name on In-vitations to ‘Fika’
Treatment Effect:Fika -.027∗∗
(.011)
Note: N = 2, 012. Entry is anOLS-coefficient from a regres-sion controlling for the genderof the e-mailer, the types of ap-peals (electoral, policy and nor-mative) included in the email,the party of the recipient andthe municipality of local partybranch. Robust standard errorin parenthesis. ∗ p < 0.10, ∗∗
p < 0.05, ∗∗∗ p < 0.01.
this variables 1 if the reply contained an invitation to ‘fika’ and/or coffee and 0 otherwise.2
As can be seen in Table C.16, the likelihood of being invited to ‘fika’ is lower for Arabic
aliases. This effect is statistically significant at p < 0.01 and fairly sizable.3 While interesting,
this outcome was not included in the pre-registration of our experiment. Therefore, we have
not included the outcome in the main analysis, but only present it here in the Appendix. In
view of our results, however, we suggest that future correspondence studies develop coding
schemes that are sensitive to culture-specific social practices, such as the one studied here.
2Note that the ‘fika’ outcome is a subset of the two outcomes (1) invitations to future party contacts and(2) invitations to future personal contacts. See Appendix A for descriptions of these outcomes.
3After having coded non-responses as a zero on the variable that measures invitation to ‘fika’, 6% of thee-mails from aliases with Swedish names received an invitation to ‘fika’, whereas the corresponding figurefor Arabic names was half of that (3%).
27
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28
