“They feel attached to the soft hierarchies of inequality to provide a sense of their place in the world” (Berlant Reference Berlant2011, 194)
A dominant thesis structuring inquiries into European politics portrays most contemporary conflicts as arising between the “losers” and “winners” of globalization and technological change, a cleavage marked most prominently by differences in education (Abou-Chadi and Hix Reference Abou-Chadi and Hix2021; Gethin, Martínez-Toledano, and Piketty Reference Gethin, Martínez-Toledano and Piketty2021; Iversen and Soskice Reference Iversen and Soskice2019; Kitschelt and Rehm Reference Kitschelt and Rehm2022; Kriesi et al. Reference Kriesi, Grande, Dolezal, Helbling, Höglinger, Hutter and Wüest2012; Vries and Hobolt Reference Vries and Hobolt2020). In addition to an unequal pattern of economic gains and losses that has deepened this division, a literature detailing a two-dimensional electoral space has shown how the divide is also, if not primarily, cultural: a cosmopolitan push for sociocultural progress facing opposition from a nationalist nostalgia for traditional societal hierarchies (Green and Shorrocks Reference Green and Shorrocks2023; Hall, Evans, and Kim Reference Hall, Evans and Kim2023; Häusermann et al. Reference Häusermann, Kurer and Zollinger2023).
A great deal of attention has been devoted to understanding how and why contemporary economic developments have given rise to culturally conservative views among knowledge economy “losers,” but there has been less analysis of the socially progressive politics of the “winners,” a group I refer to as the knowledge economy (KE) class. The KE class—in addition to being highly educated, urban, and relatively young—is known for its embrace of immigration, diversity, civil and human rights, environmental causes, and gender equality. However, the high earnings that university degrees tend to yield among members of the KE class mean that socially progressive views may coexist alongside conservative economic attitudes, making some members “cross-pressured” voters (Bullock Reference Bullock2021; Gelepithis and Giani Reference Gelepithis and Giani2022; Gidron Reference Gidron2022; Iversen and Soskice Reference Iversen and Soskice2019; Kitschelt and Rehm Reference Kitschelt and Rehm2022; Marshall Reference Marshall2016; Scott Reference Scott2022). In an inquiry illustrating the electoral consequences of these cross-pressures, Zacher (Reference Zacher2023, 349), based on an analysis of progressive voters in the United States, shows how their preferences for “relatively economically costless forms of extensions of civil rights” have been reflected in a rather static economic policy trajectory within the Democratic Party (see also Taylor Reference Taylor2024).
Although the combination of economically conservative and socially progressive policy positions may be politically possible and even popular,Footnote 1 this does not presuppose any uniform attitudinal logic nor offer any insight into the contexts in which members of the KE class can be expected to be more or less progressive. Such insight is critical not only for understanding the intensity of progressive commitments within this class, and therefore also the electoral fortunes of left parties, but also for assessing the trajectory of progressive agendas over time. Although recent work recognizes a growing “gender backlash” (Anduiza and Rico Reference Anduiza and Rico2024; Green and Shorrocks Reference Green and Shorrocks2023; Rettl et al. Reference Rettl, Bolet, De Vries, Cremaschi, Abou-Chadi and Pardos-Prado2024) alongside instances of anti-immigrant sentiments (Dennison and Geddes Reference Dennison and Geddes2019; McLaren and Paterson Reference McLaren and Paterson2020) among highly educated voters, this has yet to prompt a broader reflection on the implications for recent electoral outcomes or for the future of progressivism. The lack of attention to how these voters navigate the inevitable intersections of economic and sociocultural issues is all the more striking given a growing consensus that the “economics versus culture question” cannot fully account for backlash to globalization among knowledge economy losers (Rodrik Reference Rodrik2021) and that it is instead the interaction of economic and cultural factors that shapes their sense of status loss (Gidron and Hall Reference Gidron and Hall2017; Häusermann, Kurer, and Zollinger Reference Häusermann, Kurer and Zollinger2023).
I argue that this interaction is also key to understanding winners. Specifically, I propose that whereas the loss of status following the transition to a knowledge-based society is central to understanding the politics of losers, the pursuit of status preservation is central to understanding the politics of winners. The defining features of progressive parties reflect a legacy of postwar efforts that, by promoting the rights and recognition of disadvantaged groups, helped not only expand their representation and status in social and cultural spheres but also improved their economic prospects—from the entry of women into the workforce to the upward mobility of immigrants and their children (Häusermann and Kitschelt Reference Häusermann and Kitschelt2024). Although progressive parties largely continue to promote a platform of social justice, the costly, interventionist, and redistributive policies necessary to meaningfully address current injustices—from the gender wage gap and mass incarceration to the asymmetric burdens of climate change and trans rights—at a now more advanced stage of capitalism may increasingly come into conflict with the efforts of the KE class to maintain their status. Preserving status in a knowledge economy requires an ever-growing amount of economic, social, and cultural capital, and some winners can be expected to prioritize status preservation over equality—especially those who consider progressive achievements as largely sufficient given the current status of previously disadvantaged groups. In other words, advanced democracies find themselves in a moment where the affluence of many left-leaning voters may paradoxically limit the political scope for further progress on equality. How do sociocultural and economic transformations, unfolding in tandem, shape commitments to progressive causes, and what does this imply for the future of progressive politics in Europe?
To begin answering these questions and offer reflections on their importance for political science, I make two analytical propositions regarding the study of progressive attitudes and electorates. First, drawing attention to how the unbundling of economic and sociocultural issues can conceal consequential policy preferences within the KE class, I propose that it is at the intersection of these issues that we can better understand how and why the intensity of progressivism varies. I emphasize that just as scholars have paid careful attention to the ways in which knowledge economy losers experience economic transformations through their sociocultural effects (Gidron and Hall Reference Gidron and Hall2017; Kurer Reference Kurer2020; Off Reference Off2024), it is similarly important to consider how winners experience sociocultural progress in light of its economic consequences.
Second, I propose that the prevailing dichotomy of winners and losers can conceal consequential preferences by leading scholars to underestimate status concerns in the KE class.Footnote 2 Compared to those without university degrees, the highly educated enjoy access to various economic advantages and to social and cultural spheres that provide opportunities to compound these advantages, making winners significantly less likely to experience the status losses that have pervaded communities left behind by the transition to a knowledge economy. Yet, despite—or perhaps because of—these advantages, members of the KE class must work continuously to maintain their status in intensely competitive markets for jobs, housing, and financial wealth. Those who have found their way to secure and lucrative employment in “large successful growing cities” (Iversen and Soskice Reference Iversen and Soskice2019, 141) are highly aware of the many qualified people competing for status security in the knowledge economy—after all, they were or still are among them. The accelerated pace of competition in the knowledge economy, I propose, can intensify status concerns and related meritocratic justifications that serve to underpin weaker levels of support for progressive causes among the affluent and highly educated.
To draw out these claims and examine their implications for progressive attitudes, I apply them to one of the most prominent issues in contemporary politics, immigration, and ask, How does the status position of ethnoracial minorities influence the intensity of progressive commitments among majority members of the KE class?Footnote 3 Building on evidence revealing opposition to immigration among the highly educated (Magni Reference Magni2022; Pardos-Prado Reference Pardos-Prado2020), I argue that the accumulation of minority status gains over the last half-century in Europe, reflected in status hierarchies that are less ethnoracially stratified, can foster a politics of status preservation, which leads to declining support for immigration and redistribution alongside support for policies that facilitate social closure. Using observational data from two cross-national surveys to test these claims, I find that white-majority members of the KE class living in regions where ethnoracial minorities are better represented in high-status positions are more likely to adopt a politics of status preservation than those living in regions where ethnoracial minorities remain overrepresented in lower-status groups. These findings are in line with recent work revealing a backlash against gender equality among the highly educated (Anduiza and Rico Reference Anduiza and Rico2024; Green and Shorrocks Reference Green and Shorrocks2023; Rettl et al. Reference Rettl, Bolet, De Vries, Cremaschi, Abou-Chadi and Pardos-Prado2024; van Staalduinen and Zollinger Reference van Staalduinen and Zollinger2024) and imply that, over time, progressive causes can become undermined by the very status advancements they promote.
With these analyses, I aim to draw attention to the importance of understanding how and why voters within progressive electorates view further progress on equality as either unnecessary or undesired, the current distribution of opportunities to thrive in society as sufficiently fair, and life outcomes as an acceptable combination of individual effort and government intervention. Setting aside related normative issues,Footnote 4 I also aim to show that at the intersection of economic and sociocultural issues lie theoretical and empirical implications for how we study progressive politics. Indeed, my results reinforce research on knowledge economy losers, showing that postwar transformations of status hierarchies have been politically consequential because they carry both economic and cultural value. Finally, in line with work drawing attention to the fluid nature of the contemporary electoral space (Hall, Evans, and Kim Reference Hall, Evans and Kim2023; Häusermann and Kitschelt Reference Häusermann and Kitschelt2024), I also point to the analytical limitations of assuming certain attitudinal positions among the highly educated. At stake is a dynamic understanding of the relationship among education, status, ethnicity, race, and politics in the knowledge economy. Such an understanding is especially critical given ongoing challenges to progressivism in advanced democracies.
Progressive Politics in the Knowledge Economy Class
The knowledge economy class came of age alongside the transition to a knowledge economy, characterized by “production and services based on knowledge-intensive activities,” an “accelerated pace of technical and scientific advance,” and “greater reliance on intellectual capabilities than on physical inputs or natural resources” (Powell and Snellman Reference Powell and Snellman2004, 201). The trajectories of this class from university into jobs in tech, finance, research, and other knowledge-intensive sectors and their residence in large cities where these jobs are concentrated (Berkes and Gaetani Reference Berkes and Gaetani2023; Iversen and Soskice Reference Iversen and Soskice2019) are often seen as tightly coupled with a cosmopolitan worldview prioritizing postmaterial values (Florida Reference Florida2019; Inglehart and Norris Reference Inglehart and Norris2016). This embrace of efforts to expand civil and human rights, improve opportunities for women and minorities, and promote a green economy makes the KE class a core electorate of progressive parties (Abou-Chadi and Hix Reference Abou-Chadi and Hix2021; Ford and Jennings Reference Ford and Jennings2020; Hall, Evans, and Kim Reference Hall, Evans and Kim2023; Kitschelt and Rehm Reference Kitschelt and Rehm2022; Kriesi et al. Reference Kriesi, Grande, Dolezal, Helbling, Höglinger, Hutter and Wüest2012).
The exact contours of these progressive commitments, however, are called into question by evidence revealing conservative economic tendencies within this class. In addition to earlier work emphasizing the material interests of educated classes (Iversen and Soskice Reference Iversen and Soskice2001; Lipset and Bendix Reference Lipset and Bendix1967; Rehm Reference Rehm2011; Rueda Reference Rueda2007), recent studies reveal that university degrees are increasingly associated with opposition to taxes and redistribution (Gelepithis and Giani Reference Gelepithis and Giani2022; Marshall Reference Marshall2016; Scott Reference Scott2022). Unlike the traditional market elite, the KE class is not wholly opposed to government intervention and has been shown to favor the provision of high-quality public services in education, childcare, and healthcare (Busemeyer and Iversen Reference Busemeyer and Iversen2020; Garritzmann, Häusermann, and Palier Reference Garritzmann, Häusermann and Palier2022; Gingrich and Häusermann Reference Gingrich and Häusermann2015). Still, economic attitudes vary significantly within this class, and efforts to understand this variation are to some degree overshadowed by attention to the social progressivism of highly educated voters.
Scholarly emphasis on these socially progressive attitudes has been in part facilitated by an analytical distinction between economic and sociocultural issues: “Electoral politics is no longer dominated by battles over economic redistribution but also other forms of emancipation, equality, and identity” (Abou-Chadi and Hix Reference Abou-Chadi and Hix2021, 90). This unbundling of first- and second-dimension issues has allowed scholars to expand the playing field of postindustrial politics (Hooghe and Marks Reference Hooghe and Marks2018; Hooghe, Marks, and Kamphorst Reference Hooghe, Marks and Kamphorst2024) and disentangle the twin phenomenon of declining left parties and rising far-right parties across advanced democracies (Abou-Chadi and Wagner Reference Abou-Chadi and Wagner2020; Afonso and Rennwald Reference Afonso and Rennwald2018; Hall, Evans, and Kim Reference Hall, Evans and Kim2023; Häusermann and Kitschelt Reference Häusermann and Kitschelt2024; Kitschelt and Rehm Reference Kitschelt and Rehm2022; Rodrik Reference Rodrik2021).
However, although this unbundling is conceptually precise, in compartmentalizing economic and sociocultural issues this literature can ignore the ways in which these issues are also deeply interdependent (Lindh and McCall Reference Lindh and McCall2020). In the way that “sociocultural inequalities do have material aspects and socioeconomic inequalities are influenced by cultural resources” (Häusermann et al. Reference Häusermann, Kurer and Zollinger2023, 14), the sociocultural causes that define progressive agendas and that have advanced equality are closely linked to and indeed buttressed by economic transformations (Manza and Brooks Reference Manza and Brooks1998). Interventions championed by the postwar progressive left, from the legalization of same-sex marriage and adoption of antidiscrimination legislation to the expansion of childcare and abortion rights, helped redistribute the resources and opportunities flowing out of emerging knowledge-based economies toward historically marginalized groups (Kitschelt Reference Kitschelt1994; Oesch and Rennwald Reference Oesch and Rennwald2018). Although these groups have experienced some improvements to their economic prospects, inequalities persist, and continued progress will require continued intervention, redistribution, and norm change, which in some cases may prove costly to the affluent and advantaged. How do progressive voters reconcile their commitment to social justice with its economic implications?
The analytical separation of sociocultural and economic issues that pervades current research offers few ways forward for understanding how the KE class reconciles such tensions. Socially progressive attitudes are primarily conceptualized and measured as support for immigration, multiculturalism, LGBTQ+ rights, and gender equality (Hooghe and Marks Reference Hooghe and Marks2018; Kitschelt and Rehm Reference Kitschelt and Rehm2022; Kriesi et al. Reference Kriesi, Grande, Dolezal, Helbling, Höglinger, Hutter and Wüest2012) and are accepted as coexisting alongside weak support for economic redistribution and even an ambivalence about reducing poverty: “Concern for the poor is limited to the extent of…being concerned about becoming poor themselves. For those who have acquired the necessary skills to benefit from the knowledge economy, this is a relatively minor consideration, and the interests of the poor are therefore rarely well-attended-to” (Iversen and Soskice Reference Iversen and Soskice2019, 158). What policy preferences do winners adopt in contexts where women, those who identify as LGBTQ+, or ethnoracial minorities remain overrepresented among the poor? Or in contexts, which remain rather common, where these groups, even if enjoying some gains relative to decades ago, still face barriers to the most secure and lucrative opportunities in the knowledge economy (Cantalini, Guetto, and Panichella Reference Cantalini, Guetto and Panichella2023; Goldin Reference Goldin2021; Morel Reference Morel2015; Platt Reference Platt2019; Valfort Reference Valfort2017)?
Understanding why and how members of the KE class vary in the intensity of their commitments to progressive causes is necessary theoretically and empirically. Indeed, such inquiries have underpinned significant advancements in research on knowledge economy losers (Halikiopoulou and Vlandas Reference Halikiopoulou and Vlandas2022; Laaker Reference Laaker2024; Off Reference Off2024; Rodrik Reference Rodrik2021). Exploring the conditions under which members of the KE class will share and even sacrifice their advantages to continue advancing the interests of disadvantaged groups is critical not only for explaining electoral outcomes but also for understanding the evolution and future impact of progressive political agendas. The need for scholars to take more seriously the implications that cross-pressures carry for the strength of progressive commitments is reinforced by findings showing that highly educated electorates are divided over whether equality has been reached, how much more progress is needed, and the economic interventions that would be necessary or acceptable to bring about such progress (Gelepithis and Giani Reference Gelepithis and Giani2022; Green and Shorrocks Reference Green and Shorrocks2023; Harris Reference Harris2023). Tax cuts, privatization of public services, and other neoliberal initiatives pursued in recent years by center-left parties suggest that some members of the KE class have little interest in economic interventions that would favor historically marginalized groups (Goodman and Pepinsky Reference Goodman and Pepinsky2021; Jenson Reference Jenson, Morel, Palier and Palme2012; Joppke Reference Joppke2024; Keman Reference Keman2011; Mau Reference Mau2015; Zacher Reference Zacher2023).
The importance of examining the inconsistencies that emerge at the intersection of economic and sociocultural issues is especially evident when it comes to immigration, the support of which is widely considered to be a defining feature of progressive platforms (Hall, Evans, and Kim Reference Hall, Evans and Kim2023; Häusermann and Kitschelt Reference Häusermann and Kitschelt2024; Mewes and Mau Reference Mewes, Mau and Svallfors2012). Although economic prospects have improved for immigrants and ethnoracial minorities and they are better represented in cultural spheres, significant barriers remain, and addressing them will require continued redistribution, if not of income, then of jobs, housing, wealth, and cultural capital. As much as the KE class may embrace immigration, diversity, and human rights, these views say little about their willingness—especially among white members who may be far removed from the economic hardships that minorities still experience—to redistribute such resources or whether securing their own access to these resources overshadows what may ultimately be more abstract commitments to progressive causes. In what contexts do members of the KE class prioritize self-interests?
Although the literature offers little theoretical guidance for such questions, it does provide evidence that the KE class is not unwavering in its support for immigration; for example, when it is linked to job competition (Bansak, Hainmueller, and Hangartner Reference Bansak, Hainmueller and Hangartner2016; Bolet Reference Bolet2020; Pardos-Prado Reference Pardos-Prado2020; Pecoraro and Ruedin Reference Pecoraro and Ruedin2020) or to welfare costs associated with nonwhite populations (Magni Reference Magni2022; Naumann and Stoetzer Reference Naumann and Stoetzer2018; Rueda Reference Rueda2018). There is also evidence showing that support for immigration is of relatively low priority among progressive voters, suggesting it may be easily sidelined in certain contexts (Kustov Reference Kustov2023). These attitudinal trends, together with evidence of a rightward shift on immigration in progressive agendas across Europe (Dancygier and Margalit Reference Dancygier and Margalit2020; Goodman and Pepinsky Reference Goodman and Pepinsky2021; Joppke Reference Joppke2024), call for a more robust framework for understanding how and why the intensity of progressive commitments varies within the KE class. Sociocultural progress may be easy to support as long as it is considered “costless” (Zacher Reference Zacher2023), but this support may be weaker in contexts where continued progress is considered either too costly or unnecessary among white members of the KE class.
The Politics of Status Preservation
I propose that a framework for understanding varying commitments to progressivism should draw inspiration from theoretical advancements in research exploring how status losses among knowledge economy losers influence their political attitudes and behavior (Gidron and Hall Reference Gidron and Hall2017; Green, Hellwig, and Fieldhouse Reference Green, Hellwig and Fieldhouse2022; Kurer Reference Kurer2020). This scholarship has greatly deepened our understanding of what status losses entail; early accounts emphasizing changes in material conditions, such as unemployment or stagnant income growth, were gradually complemented by work showing that economic disadvantage is linked to broader sociocultural change and often also experienced as a loss of social and cultural status relative to other groups (Rodrik Reference Rodrik2021). A key contribution of this research has been to draw out the link between short-term material conditions and long-term status aspirations and to reveal that the loss of status—both its economic and cultural dimensions—is politically consequential (Bornschier et al. Reference Bornschier, Häusermann, Zollinger and Colombo2021; Engler and Weisstanner Reference Engler and Weisstanner2021; Häusermann et al. Reference Häusermann, Kurer and Zollinger2023).
Research on progressive electorates has yet to fully incorporate these insights, in part because of the ways in which the dichotomy of losers and winners can preclude consideration of status anxieties among the economically advantaged (Gallego and Kurer Reference Gallego and Kurer2022; Lindh and McCall Reference Lindh and McCall2020). Although some scholars have drawn attention to the precarity certain winners face (Häusermann, Kurer, and Zollinger Reference Häusermann, Kurer and Zollinger2023; Thewissen and Rueda Reference Thewissen and Rueda2019; van Staalduinen and Zollinger Reference van Staalduinen and Zollinger2024) and to variation in attitudes among the highly educated more generally (Broockman, Ferenstein, and Malhotra Reference Broockman, Ferenstein and Malhotra2019; Green and Shorrocks Reference Green and Shorrocks2023; Hooghe, Marks, and Kamphorst Reference Hooghe, Marks and Kamphorst2024; Kitschelt and Rehm Reference Kitschelt and Rehm2022; Laaker Reference Laaker2024), on the whole the gains of the KE class underpin their system-stabilizing politics (Gallego, Kurer, and Schöll Reference Gallego, Kurer and Schöll2022; Iversen and Soskice Reference Iversen and Soskice2001; Kurer and van Staalduinen Reference Kurer and van Staalduinen2022). But unequivocal material advantages do not prevent members of the KE class from feeling that they have not (yet) achieved as many gains as they had hoped—especially as standards for success continuously shift in the knowledge economy—or that they or their children are at risk of (relative) status loss in the future (Berriochoa and Busemeyer Reference Berriochoa and Busemeyer2025; Häusermann, Kurer, and Zollinger Reference Häusermann, Kurer and Zollinger2023).
Building on ideas pervasive in the literature on the politics of status loss—namely, that status anxieties are relative and linked to both material interests and sociocultural hierarchies—I develop a theoretical framework for exploring the sources of variation in progressive attitudes within the KE class. After developing this framework I apply it to the issue of immigration, linking the status position of ethnoracial minorities to status concerns among winners and, as a result, to a heightened potential for less progressive politics.
Importantly, my framework concerns attitudinal variation within a broad group that emerges gradually, influenced by the decades-long accumulation of status advancements among ethnoracial minorities; for example, changes in neighborhood composition that unfold over years, the slow diffusion of minority representation into popular culture and mainstream media, or incremental increases in the number of minority colleagues at work (Crul et al. Reference Crul, Lelie, Keskiner, Michon and Waldring2023). My interest is not in demographic shocks that may provoke an abrupt change in attitudes. Instead, this framework aims to capture how developments over the last half-century in the promotion, awareness, and embrace of minorities’ presence in spheres from which they were once excluded have gradually given rise to apprehension about further progress among some high-status white majorities, especially as the stakes for winning in the knowledge economy intensify. The attitudinal differences in which I am interested, then, are not necessarily conscious changes within an individual but more so the differences that emerge between otherwise similar KE class members because of the ways in which the regions where they live, work, and socialize provide signals about the ongoing intensification of status competition and its relationship to ethnoracial hierarchies. In certain contexts, attitudes that are relatively less progressive may seem to their beholders as progressive enough.
Material Interests, Status, and Ethnoracial Hierarchies
Right-leaning economic attitudes held by members of the KE class are often understood to be a function of their high income levels, reflecting material interests that are unrelated to socially progressive values (Kriesi et al. Reference Kriesi, Grande, Dolezal, Helbling, Höglinger, Hutter and Wüest2012). But if we appreciate that, as a high-status group, the KE class is at least to some degree interested in status security, these material interests become much more deeply linked to sociocultural issues (Bourdieu Reference Bourdieu1979); “people’s sense of subjective social status can be affected both by changes in their material situation and by changes in the collective cultural frameworks that bear on their social identities” (Gidron and Hall Reference Gidron and Hall2017, 7).
A Weberian approach to status emphasizes that “lifestyle is the most typical way through which members of different status groups…seek to define their boundaries—that is, to establish cues or markers of inclusion and exclusion” (Chan and Goldthorpe Reference Chan and Goldthorpe2007, 522), and consumption and cultural tastes are widely recognized to be an important part of that lifestyle (Bornschier et al. Reference Bornschier, Häusermann, Zollinger and Colombo2021; Bourdieu Reference Bourdieu1979). Membership in the knowledge economy, centered around residence in “big successful cities” where knowledge-intensive jobs and key social networks are concentrated (Berkes and Gaetani Reference Berkes and Gaetani2023; Chetty et al. Reference Chetty, Jackson, Kuchler, Stroebel, Hendren, Fluegge, Gong, Gonzalez, Grondin and Jacob2022; Iversen and Soskice Reference Iversen and Soskice2019; Langtry Reference Langtry2023), involves a pattern of consumption that requires extensive resources to facilitate home ownership in these cities (Ansell and Cansunar Reference Ansell and Cansunar2021; Le Galès and Pierson Reference Le Galès and Pierson2019), participation in the activities of high-status social networks such as dining out and international travel, and the accumulation of the specific branded goods, services, and experiences that mark status in the KE class (Currid-Halkett, Lee, and Painter Reference Currid-Halkett, Lee and Painter2019; Florida Reference Florida2019). For those with children for whom they want to secure a university education, the resource requirements are even steeper. Securing these resources in the pursuit of status maintenance is immediately relevant for the short-term material conditions of KE class members: their current occupation and income levels shape social networks, prospects for mobility, earnings growth, long-term job security, and the accumulation of wealth (Melcher Reference Melcher2023; Morgan Reference Morgan2018).
The key implication for progressive politics is that, whereas the loss of status following the transition to a knowledge-based society is central to understanding the politics of losers, the pursuit of status maintenance is central to understanding the politics of winners. I propose that this is especially relevant in contexts where status hierarchies—in this case, ethnoracial hierarchies—have undergone change since the postwar era.
Ethnoracial hierarchies are socially constructed, ranked systems that ascribe social, economic, and cultural status to ethnoracial groups. Across Europe, white, secular, or Christian people of European or Anglo-Saxon ancestry have often been ascribed higher ranks, and nonwhite, Muslim or other non-Christian people of African, Middle-Eastern, South American, or Asian ancestry have been ascribed lower ranks (Beaman Reference Beaman2017; Geddes Reference Geddes2016; Meer Reference Meer2013). This majority–minority group distinction and ranking remain the dominant, if broad and often inaccurate, dividing line in Europe used to capture and give value to visible ethnic, racial, and cultural differences. The borders of these differences are constantly in flux, especially when examined up close and in context, and the majority–minority distinction does not necessarily reflect the numerical share of a certain group (Lutz and Bitschnau Reference Lutz and Bitschnau2023; Simon Reference Simon2012). Despite or indeed because of its ambiguities, this group distinction continues to orient social and cultural identities in European societies and thus carries significant political power (Balibar and Wallerstein Reference Balibar and Wallerstein2005). It is precisely this multidimensional and fluid nature that has made ethnoracial status an especially useful structure through which to explore the politics of status among losers (Off Reference Off2024).
Changes in ethnoracial hierarchies in Europe have emerged gradually through the layering and interaction of economic, social, political, and cultural phenomena. As mentioned previously, since the end of World War II, social movements and policy interventions championed by the progressive left and buttressed by broader structural changes have succeeded in reducing some of the disadvantages faced by ethnoracial minorities in Europe (Crul, Schneider, and Lelie Reference Crul, Schneider and Lelie2012; Heath, Rothon, and Kilpi Reference Heath, Rothon and Kilpi2008; Soysal Reference Soysal1994). Importantly, ethnoracial status shifts are ongoing, vary greatly by country and region, and are not indicative of ethnoracial equality. European societies still have a considerable amount of progress to make; experiences of socioeconomic precarity, from unemployment and temporary work to inequalities in access to education and other public services, remain disproportionately high in immigrant and minority communities (De Coninck and Solano Reference Berkes and Gaetani2023; Guzi, Kahanec, and Mýtna Kureková Reference Guzi, Kahanec and Kureková2021; Platt Reference Platt2019). Xenophobic narratives portraying minority cultures as inferior and at odds with European values are increasingly popular and sometimes lead to legislation that aims to curb or criminalize certain behaviors (Barker Reference Barker2017; Bleich, Bloemraad, and De Graauw Reference Bleich, Bloemraad and De Graauw2015; Bonjour and Duyvendak Reference Bonjour and Duyvendak2018). Still, relative to postwar Europe, minorities have experienced upward economic mobility (Crul Reference Crul2018; Heath, Rothon, and Kilpi Reference Heath, Rothon and Kilpi2008; Schneider, Crul, and Pott Reference Schneider, Crul and Pott2022) and better representation, formally through the extension of civil and social rights (Aktürk and Katliarou Reference Aktürk and Katliarou2021) and informally in culture and media as societies have “habituated” to immigration (Bauböck and Scholten Reference Bauböck and Scholten2016; Claassen and McLaren Reference Claassen and McLaren2022). These advancements have helped erode ethnoracial stratification, making ethnicity and race weaker indicators of status rank than in the mid-twentieth century (Crul, Schneider, and Lelie Reference Crul, Schneider and Lelie2012; Modood and de Waal Reference Modood, de Waal, Levrau and Clycq2021).
The transformation of ethnoracial hierarchies across Europe matters as much for understanding the politics of KE winners as for understanding the politics of losers. As ethnoracial minorities have gradually gained access to more resources and jobs, facilitated not only through educational achievements but also through political efforts that recognize and celebrate minority cultures, the visibility and mutual reinforcement of these gains—in demonstrating how sociocultural progress is inseparable from economic change—may underpin weaker commitments to progressive causes. These status gains may not only counter concerns of persistent ethnoracial inequality; they may also herald a future that entails certain costs to advantaged white majorities. The growing presence of visible ethnoracial minorities in workplaces and recognition of their contributions in art, media, and politics have become prominent features of contemporary European societies (Crul et al. Reference Crul, Lelie, Keskiner, Michon and Waldring2023; Magazzini Reference Magazzini, Nikielska-Sekula and Desille2021; Modood and de Waal Reference Modood, de Waal, Levrau and Clycq2021; Schneider, Crul, and Pott Reference Schneider, Crul and Pott2022), and supporters of far-right parties are not the only electorate to draw links between these broad developments and their own status prospects. Whether at work, around the neighborhood, or through news media, majority members of the KE class recognize that status prospects in society are closely linked to group membership based on salient social and cultural identities (Häusermann et al. Reference Häusermann, Kurer and Zollinger2023). Such experiences are arguably especially consequential for politics within this class because it is the contributions of highly educated, well-resourced white voters to redistributive agendas that help make continued progress possible.
The transformation of ethnoracial status hierarchies thus underpins exclusionary tendencies on the left—what I call a politics of status preservation, which involves opposition to immigration on both economic and cultural grounds, opposition to redistribution, and support for policies that facilitate social closure.Footnote 5 Despite a focus here on ethnoracial hierarchies, the attitudes I outline and their political consequences apply to any historically marginalized group that has experienced (some) status advancements since the postwar era. Furthermore, although the attitudes are adopted at the individual level, they are also influenced by developments at the group level—that is, between majorities and minorities—that shape how members of the KE class evaluate their status prospects. Although a more extensive exploration of the relationship between individual and group status is beyond the scope of this article (van Staalduinen and Zollinger Reference van Staalduinen and Zollinger2024; Zollinger Reference Zollinger2024), its theoretical framework nonetheless elaborates how self interests can be influenced by broader sociocultural considerations.
Status Preservation in Ethnoracial Hierarchies
Some members of the KE class consider the improved representation of ethnoracial minorities in high-status positions as a signal of heightened competition over knowledge economy status and adopt attitudes that, although on the whole are progressive, are less progressive than those of their peers. I highlight two key, though not exhaustive, attitudes here. The first attitude involves concern about accessing and securing the resources necessary for maintaining status in the knowledge economy. The second attitude involves a sense that, given progressive achievements thus far, the playing field is relatively fair and no further interventions in favor of ethnoracial minorities are necessary. These attitudes in turn shape preferences regarding immigration and government intervention.
The first attitude relates to how the stakes of competition in the knowledge economy have intensified concerns about future status security. Maintaining status in the KE class involves successfully competing in numerous markets, especially those distributing jobs, housing, education, and financial wealth. The concentration and integration of these markets in large cities accelerate the pace of economic activity and the accumulation of capital (Berkes and Gaetani Reference Berkes and Gaetani2023; Grusky, Hall, and Markus Reference Grusky, Hall and Markus2019; Le Galès and Pierson Reference Le Galès and Pierson2019). There is evidence indicating that some members of the KE class share a sense of rising competition—that there are only so many positions at top universities, jobs at leading firms, and homes in good neighborhoods (Ansell and Gingrich Reference Ansell, Gingrich, Rosenbluth and Weir2021; Häusermann, Kurer, and Zollinger Reference Häusermann, Kurer and Zollinger2023; Iversen and Soskice Reference Iversen and Soskice2001). Regardless of whether competition is in fact increasing or why, some members of the KE class may interpret the presence of ethnoracial minorities in high-status positions as indicative of rising competition over the resources necessary for maintaining status in the knowledge economy.
The second attitude relates to how perceived status competition strengthens beliefs about merit and equality of opportunity. Meritocratic beliefs are growing more widespread in Europe (Mau Reference Mau2015; Mijs Reference Mijs2021), which research suggests may be the result of the upward career trajectories experienced by many members of the KE class (Beramendi et al. Reference Beramendi, Häusermann, Kitschelt and Kriesi2015; Lipset and Bendix Reference Lipset and Bendix1967; Mijs et al. Reference Mijs, Daenekindt, De Koster and Van Der Waal2022). Although commitments to meritocracy among the upwardly mobile may reflect beliefs about their own efforts (Benabou and Ok Reference Benabou and Ok2001)—“the winners must believe they have earned their success through their own talent and hard work” (Sandel Reference Sandel2020, 1)—they also influence how winners view individual effort and life outcomes more broadly. In addition to work in sociology linking meritocratic beliefs to “self-justification” in high-status groups (Friedman et al. Reference Friedman, Ellersgaard, Reeves and Larsen2024), evidence suggests that such beliefs also motivate the acceptance of educational inequality among the highly educated (Häusermann et al. Reference Häusermann, Kurer and Zollinger2023; Kuppens et al. Reference Kuppens, Spears, Antony, Spruyt and Easterbrook2018). Rising belief in meritocracy may thus be indicative of a sense that equality has been reached and no further redistribution is necessary: hard work and merit can now compete on equal ground.
These attitudes—mounting concerns about status maintenance and growing support for meritocracy—can be expected to influence views on immigration and government intervention within the KE class. Given that material interests have already been shown to motivate anti-immigrant sentiments (Beramendi and Rehm Reference Beramendi and Rehm2016; Bolet Reference Bolet2020; Ferwerda, Flynn, and Horiuchi Reference Ferwerda, Flynn and Horiuchi2017; Pardos-Prado Reference Pardos-Prado2020), the presence of ethnoracial minorities in high-status positions may reinforce conservative tendencies regarding immigration within the KE class, especially among those for whom immigration is of relatively low priority (Kustov Reference Kustov2023). Relatedly, social psychologists have emphasized that, although some members of advantaged groups support progressive causes to improve the status of the disadvantaged group or abide by a broader set of morals, others do so primarily to ensure the continued status of their own group or to protect individual needs and interests (Radke et al. Reference Radke, Kutlaca, Siem, Wright and Becker2020). This literature also emphasizes that, because those with high status “have more to lose from changing status relations, [they] are therefore likely to perceive greater intergroup competition, and to endorse [zero-sum beliefs] more than low-status groups” (Wilkins et al. Reference Wilkins, Wellman, Babbitt, Toosi and Schad2015, 2). Taken together, this evidence suggests that some members of the KE class only weakly, perhaps in some cases symbolically or performatively, support immigration and that this support is easily overshadowed by self-interest in contexts of intense status concern.
When it comes to views on redistribution, there are various ways in which status concerns and meritocratic beliefs might reinforce conservative tendencies among some members of the KE class. In tightening their grip over the material resources necessary for status maintenance, status concerns can prompt members of the KE class to become especially skeptical about taxation and redistribution (Iversen and Soskice Reference Iversen and Soskice2001; Mau Reference Mau2015). Given evidence that, in some contexts, even progressive voters “strongly penalize immigrants” when it comes to welfare deservingness (Magni Reference Magni2022, 73) and that affluent groups prioritize material interests over moral commitments when redistribution involves immigrant minorities (Rueda Reference Rueda2018), opposition to redistribution can be expected to be especially common in contexts where ethnoracial minorities are better represented in high-status positions. This opposition may be simultaneously reinforced by a rising belief in meritocracy. Work exploring the link between such beliefs and redistributive preferences shows that the experience of upward mobility in legitimizing individual effort can reduce support for redistribution (Alesina, Stantcheva, and Teso Reference Alesina, Stantcheva and Teso2018; Benabou and Ok Reference Benabou and Ok2001; Lipset and Bendix Reference Lipset and Bendix1967; Mijs et al. Reference Mijs, Daenekindt, De Koster and Van Der Waal2022).
The effects of perceived status competition on preferences regarding government intervention may not only take the form of opposition to redistribution but may also manifest as support for policies that stratify access to resources and opportunities; in other words, policies that facilitate social closure. Sociologists have long drawn attention to processes of social closure, or “opportunity hoarding” (Tilly Reference Tilly1999), whereby high-status groups leverage their institutional advantages to maintain access to the resources that are most valuable to them and that help them sustain membership in the group (Valentino and Vaisey Reference Valentino and Vaisey2022). These resources include “access to elite education, social networks, employment, and the acquisition of cultural capital,” as well as access to the cultural and public spaces where these networks gather and exchange information (Le Galès and Pierson Reference Le Galès and Pierson2019, 48).
The forms of government intervention that the KE class has been shown to support may, in some instances, serve as policies of social closure. Studies demonstrate how demand for high-quality public services can have “Matthew effects” whereby access to these services—especially in education and housing—is stratified not only in favor of high-status groups but also to the disadvantage of ethnoracial minorities (Garritzmann, Häusermann, and Palier Reference Garritzmann, Häusermann and Palier2022; Gingrich Reference Gingrich2022; Grusky, Hall, and Markus Reference Grusky, Hall and Markus2019; Le Galès and Pierson Reference Le Galès and Pierson2019; Pöyliö, Erola, and Kilpi-Jakonen Reference Pöyliö, Erola and Kilpi-Jakonen2018; Söderström and Uusitalo Reference Söderström and Uusitalo2010). Other popular interventions, such as activation measures and subsidies for childcare and domestic services, also carry the potential to facilitate social closure, with pronounced consequences for ethnoracial minorities (Bonoli Reference Bonoli2020; Cronert Reference Cronert2022; Sciortino Reference Sciortino2004). First, in promising lower welfare and service costs, these policies protect the material interests that contribute to status preservation. Second, in delegating low-wage work to lower-status groups otherwise at risk of unemployment, they indicate an acceptance of status hierarchies based on effort and merit and ensure that “the high-skilled can devote more time to productive tasks,” including those most relevant for status preservation (Morel Reference Morel2015, 217).
Importantly, the experience of competing for knowledge economy status is specific to local and regional contexts (Berriochoa and Busemeyer Reference Berriochoa and Busemeyer2025). Although knowledge economy jobs and social networks are primarily located in cities (Berkes and Gaetani Reference Berkes and Gaetani2023; Iammarino, Rodriguez-Pose, and Storper Reference Iammarino, Rodriguez-Pose and Storper2019; Iversen and Soskice Reference Iversen and Soskice2019), and cities tend to be ethnoracially diverse and more opportunity-rich for minorities (Crul et al. Reference Crul, Lelie, Keskiner, Michon and Waldring2023), this varies across metropolitan areas in Europe. Cities vary in their specific patterns of high-wage job growth, living costs, and the extent to which the ethnoracial minorities living there have been able to pursue the opportunities that, in theory, are open to them (Crul, Schneider, and Lelie Reference Crul, Schneider and Lelie2012; De Coninck and Solano Reference De Coninck and Solano2023; Ehrlich and Overman Reference Ehrlich and Overman2020). As such, competition over knowledge economy status and its political consequences require attention to the local and regional contexts where the structure of ethnoracial hierarchies may be more palpable. A similar shift in geographical focus has proven increasingly relevant in research on status loss (Bolet Reference Bolet2020; Broz, Frieden, and Weymouth Reference Broz, Frieden and Weymouth2021; Huijsmans and Rodden Reference Huijsmans and Rodden2025; Patana Reference Patana2020).
In sum, a politics of status preservation—opposition to immigration and redistribution alongside support for policies that facilitate social closure—is especially likely in contexts where ethnoracial minorities are present in higher-status positions because of the societal progress and potential costs that this presence signals to white majorities. More specifically, I expect members of the KE class to adopt a politics of status preservation in regions where ethnoracial minorities are better represented in high-status positions. Meanwhile, in regions where ethnoracial minorities remain overrepresented in lower-status positions, I expect members of the KE class to support immigration and redistribution and oppose policies of social closure.
Data and Analysis
To explore these hypotheses, I draw on cross-sectional data from the European Social Survey (ESS, ERIC 2023), aggregated from 12 countries and 10 rounds (2002–20), and from the survey, Investing in Education in Europe: Attitudes, Politics and Policies (INVEDUC; Busemeyer et al. Reference Busemeyer, Garritzmann, Neimanns and Nezi2018), fielded in 8 European countries in 2014.Footnote 6 The ESS, with approximately 1,500 respondents per country in each round, includes widely used items on immigration and redistribution. The INVEDUC, a smaller survey with approximately 7,000 respondents in total, includes items on social closure. Both surveys include regional indicators for level two of the Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics (NUTS-2; only NUTS-1, level one, is available for Germany), which are geographic codes developed and regulated by the EU that allow me to quantitatively capture the ethnoracial structure of regional status hierarchies.
To prepare the data for analysis, I divided the full ESS sample into two subsamples: ethnoracial majorities and minorities (see fn. 3). To examine my expectations about political attitudes among white members of the knowledge economy, I use the majority sample for the main analysis; I use the minority sample to quantitatively capture the relative status position of ethnoracial minorities at the regional level; that is, ethnoracial minorities are not included as respondents in the sample used for the main analysis. Although some ethnoracial minorities are members of the KE class and their attitudes deserve equal attention, for the purposes of this article and in an effort to balance attention toward the white working class with attention toward the white educated class, I focus on patterns in advantaged white-majority attitudes.
Before further detailing the independent and dependent variables, it is worth noting that the data I draw from are observational and cross sectional. Despite the limitations of such data for establishing causal links, they are sufficient for exploring how variation in the structure of ethnoracial hierarchies is linked to attitudinal differences among high-status white majorities. Although immigration “shocks” and instances of anti-immigrant rhetoric matter for such patterns (Enos Reference Enos2023), I am less interested in isolating the effects of such causes and more interested in how the accumulation of status advancements among minorities since the postwar era and increasing public attention to these advancements and their policy implications are linked to attitudinal differences within the KE class. Localized panel data tracking the evolution of attitudes alongside incremental status shifts unfolding over decades would be ideal for capturing the microlevel processes underlying the variation of interest here; however, as I explain later, the measures I rely on for both the dependent and independent variables sufficiently capture the status reference points that I have argued matter to affluent white majorities and the broad direction of the attitudes in question.
Independent Variables
The independent variables are membership in the KE class, measured at the individual level, and the regional status position of ethnoracial minorities, measured at the regional level. To measure membership in the KE class, a status defined by the high levels of education required to access the knowledge economy and the high income levels associated with knowledge-intensive occupations (Iversen and Soskice Reference Iversen and Soskice2019; Oesch and Rennwald Reference Oesch and Rennwald2018), I combine information on respondent education and self-reported income decile to create a dichotomous indicator assigning a value of one to those with a university degree and earnings in at least the sixth income decile (fourth quantile in INVEDUC). For the robustness checks shown in appendix tables A3–A8, I use a more granular measure of membership in the KE class: the sum of educational level (ISCED, five levels) and self-reported income decile, resulting in a measure ranging from 2 to 15 (2–10 in INVEDUC).Footnote 7 Although such measures are not common in research on political attitudes among the highly educated, which instead tends to separate income and education as emphasized earlier, these two dimensions of advantage are tightly coupled in the knowledge economy, blurring the typical distinction between affluent business professionals and sociocultural professionals with lower earnings (Kitschelt Reference Kitschelt1994; Kriesi et al. Reference Kriesi, Grande, Dolezal, Helbling, Höglinger, Hutter and Wüest2012). That sociocultural professionals are increasingly finding work in lucrative industries such as tech and consulting contributes to the cross-pressures that are of interest here. To account for well-known differences between the business and cultural elite, I include controls for occupation in the analysis.
To quantitatively capture the regional status position of ethnoracial minorities, I calculate four measures at the NUTS-2 regional level (NUTS-1 in Germany): the share of ethnoracial minorities (a) in the bottom three income deciles, (b) in the top three income deciles, (c) among the unemployed, and (d) employed in knowledge-intensive jobs. Higher rates of a and c indicate regions where ethnoracial hierarchies are more stratified because minorities remain overrepresented in lower-status groups, whereas higher rates of b and d indicate regions that are less stratified.
For measures a and b, I use self-reported income decile among ESS minority respondents to calculate the share of ethnoracial minorities living in each region that are in the bottom and in the top three income deciles. For d, I draw on work in economics that identifies knowledge-intensive jobs based on their tasks (Autor and Dorn Reference Autor and Dorn2013; Deming Reference Deming2017). To do so, I link the ISCO-08 occupational codes provided in the ESS to data on the task composition of jobs in Europe (Hardy, Keister, and Lewandowski Reference Hardy, Keister and Lewandowski2018), resulting in average task intensities for each occupation. I then calculate the share of ethnoracial minorities employed in occupations that are intensive in nonroutine analytical and interactive tasks in each region. For c, I leverage another source of data, given the poor quality of unemployment information in the ESS, especially for the minority sample. Using Eurostat data on employment patterns at the NUTS-2 level, I measure the rate of unemployment among non-EU foreign nationals in each region.Footnote 8 After linking these measures with the NUTS indicators attached to each respondent in the majority sample, I then transform each measure into a ranked measure, assigning regions a rank from 1 to 50 based on their position in the distribution of regions for a given measure. Table 1 shows the regions that rank highly for each measure, with the largest city in each region indicated in parentheses. The regions listed in the first and third sections of the table, “Low-income share” and “Unemployment rate,” are the most ethnoracially stratified, whereas those in the second and fourth sections, “High-income share” and “KE employment,” are the least ethnoracially stratified. To some degree, the patterns align along expected urban–rural divides, although there are instances where the growth of knowledge-intensive industries (e.g., energy) has seemingly helped facilitate minority advancement in rural areas.
Ethnoracial Minority Status Position
It is worth emphasizing the limitations of these measures. In addition to only capturing a cross-sectional view of ethnoracial status hierarchies, these measures do not capture the status position of ethnoracial minorities as perceived by white majorities (Brader, Valentino, and Suhay Reference Brader, Valentino and Suhay2008; Lutz and Bitschnau Reference Lutz and Bitschnau2023). Survey items capturing perceptions of ethnoracial status gains would be a more accurate test of my claims (Green, Hellwig, and Fieldhouse Reference Green, Hellwig and Fieldhouse2022). However, the characteristics of the ethnoracial minority sample in the ESS—most of these respondents were either born in the survey country or have lived there for more than 20 years—suggest that these measures do capture regional variation in the degree to which ethnoracial minorities have experienced status advancements over the past half-century. That is, these measures reflect the incremental and uneven accumulation of status gains among minorities in Europe since immigration began increasing during the postwar era (Crul Reference Crul2018; Heath, Rothon, and Kilpi Reference Heath, Rothon and Kilpi2008). Although the measures do not directly capture awareness of such gains among advantaged white majorities, given the confluence of factors necessary to bring status advancements to minority communities—advantageous structural change (Oesch Reference Oesch2013; Wright and Dwyer Reference Wright and Dwyer2003), persistent political movements (Barron et al. Reference Barron, Bory, Chauvin, Jounin and Tourette2016; Dancygier Reference Dancygier2010; De Graauw and Vermeulen Reference De Graauw and Vermeulen2016), and openness in mainstream media, popular culture, and public life (Crul et al. Reference Crul, Lelie, Keskiner, Michon and Waldring2023)—any status gains captured by these cross-sectional measures likely correspond with status reference points that are palpable and salient for advantaged white majorities. Additionally, what matters is not necessarily direct exposure to the specific status gains (or lack thereof) that comprise the current ethnoracial structure of regional hierarchies but rather how this structure represents and signals the past achievements and future aims of progressive politics.
In sum, despite the limitations of such measures, this analysis is an attempt to illustrate how knowledge economy winners, similar in other ways, vary in the intensity of their support for progressive causes. Although failing to establish any causal link between their views of long-term ethnoracial status changes and their positions on immigration and social policy, I offer a starting point for exploring the many contextual factors that influence the intensity of progressive commitments by highlighting this dimension of variation within the KE class. At a moment when the future status prospects of ethnoracial minorities are at the center of politics, identifying such factors and their implications for progressive attitudes within this electorally critical group is especially important.
Dependent Variables
To capture opposition to immigration on economic or cultural grounds within the KE class, I use responses to two items. The first asks, “Would you say that people who come to live here generally take jobs away from workers in [country], or generally help to create new jobs?” with responses ranging from “create new jobs” (0) to “take jobs away” (10). The second asks, “Would you say that [country]’s cultural life is generally undermined or enriched by people coming to live here from other countries?” with responses ranging from “cultural life enriched” (0) to “cultural life undermined” (10).Footnote 9 To capture preferences regarding redistribution, I rely on the ESS item widely used in comparative political economy: “The government should take measures to reduce differences in income levels,” with responses ranging from “agree strongly” (1) to “disagree strongly” (5).
To capture support for policies of social closure, I rely on responses to two items in INVEDUC that ask respondents to indicate the degree to which they agree with the following: “Children with different social backgrounds should be taught in different schools in order to provide more targeted support” and “Forcing [the] unemployed to accept a job quickly, even if it is not as good as their previous job.” Whereas the former item is standard in literature analyzing stratification in school systems (Gingrich Reference Gingrich2019), the latter is at best an indirect measure of support for social closure. It is designed to measure support for activation, which some scholars have linked to stratified outcomes, although such measures typically matter less to the knowledge economy class than educational interventions (Garritzmann et al. Reference Garritzmann, Häusermann, Kurer, Palier, Pinggera, Garritzmann, Häusermann and Palier2022); any results should thus be interpreted carefully and primarily as inspiration for future survey research. Table 2 provides an overview of the independent and dependent variables, and tables A1 and A2 in the appendix provide summary statistics for all variables.
Variable Summary
Analysis
I use linear regression models to estimate the predicted levels of opposition to immigration and redistribution and of support for social closure. The survey items listed in the top of table 2 serve as the dependent variable: for each item I conduct four regression analyses, one for each measure capturing the relative status position of ethnoracial minorities. The main independent variables of interest are those concerning the interactive effect of KE class status and the status position of ethnoracial minorities—both the constituent variables and the interaction term (Armingeon and Weisstanner Reference Armingeon and Weisstanner2022). In the following analyses, I estimate pooled models with country-fixed effects and controls for regional unemployment and GDP, although the results are robust to alternative specifications using multilevel models with cross-level interactions (see tables A3–A8 in the appendix). All models also include individual-level controls for gender, birth cohort, age, occupation, and skill specificity; occupation and skill specificity account for expected divides between members of the KE class (Iversen and Soskice Reference Iversen and Soskice2001; Kriesi et al. Reference Kriesi, Grande, Dolezal, Helbling, Höglinger, Hutter and Wüest2012; Pardos-Prado and Xena Reference Pardos-Prado and Xena2019).
The plots show the main results; namely, how the predicted levels of opposition to immigration and redistribution and of support for social closure vary within the KE class depending on the status position of ethnoracial minorities relative to other regions. In each plot I present estimates from two models to juxtapose variation among KE class members based on how ethnoracial stratification is being measured. In discussing these plots, for ease of interpretation I focus on the predictions for respondents living in regions ranking especially high on each measure.
The results for attitudes toward immigration are shown in figures 1 and 2 (tables A3 and A4 in the appendix), revealing patterns that partly confirm my hypotheses: KE class members living in regions where ethnoracial minorities occupy higher-status positions are more opposed to immigration, especially on economic grounds, than those living in regions where ethnoracial minorities are overrepresented in lower-status positions. Figure 2 suggests that the interaction is weaker when it comes to opposition to immigration on cultural grounds; indeed, as shown in table A4, the estimates for the interaction term only reach significance in models with income-based measures for ethnoracial hierarchies. Although these results could be interpreted as evidence that the status position of ethnoracial minorities is primarily felt in economic terms, as explained earlier, the cultural capital associated with KE employment suggests that a sense of job threat is not based purely on economic grounds. Furthermore, the reference to national culture in the survey question may fail to fully capture perceptions about how immigration affects the specific cultural status of the KE class. At the least, attitudes related to the effects of immigration on cultural status appear especially sensitive to contextual factors. It may be that, given evidence of affluent groups linking immigration to crime in certain contexts (Rueda and Stegmueller Reference Rueda and Stegmueller2016), members of the KE class feel more mixed about immigration when ethnoracial disadvantage takes the form of unemployment (column 3 of table A4). Meanwhile, when minority gains take the form of KE employment (column 4 of table A4), it may be that, for example, the status concerns of advantaged white members of the KE class are attenuated by experiences working alongside minorities at work (Andersson and Dehdari Reference Andersson and Dehdari2021). The potential role of such considerations and any links to status concerns is a worthwhile avenue for future research.
Predicted levels of opposition to immigration within KE class (economic).
Predicted levels of opposition to immigration within KE class (cultural).
The results for attitudes toward redistribution are shown in figure 3 and table A5, which also reveal patterns in line with my hypotheses. KE class members living in regions where ethnoracial minorities occupy higher-status positions are more opposed to redistribution than those living in regions where ethnoracial minorities occupy lower-status positions. I conduct the same analysis with the redistribution item in INVEDUC, and the results are largely consistent with those from the ESS analysis (see table A8 and figure A1 in the appendix).
Predicted levels of opposition to redistribution within KE class.
Finally, the results for social closure are shown in figures 4 and 5 and tables A6 and A7 in the appendix. Figure 4 shows that KE class members are more supportive of social closure in education in regions where ethnoracial minorities are better represented in higher-status positions and less supportive in regions where ethnoracial minorities remain overrepresented in lower-status positions. Meanwhile, majorities are less supportive of social closure in employment in regions where minorities occupy lower-status positions and more so in regions where minorities are better represented in the top income ranks; minority employment in KE occupations is weakly related to attitudes toward job activation. Although these patterns are largely in line with my hypotheses, the estimates are weaker and, given the smaller sample size of the INVEDUC and the aforementioned limitations of its survey items, should be thus interpreted with caution. Still, the patterns do point to the potential for social closure behavior within the KE class, especially in education systems. Scholars interested in exploring “hoarding” tendencies should work to develop items that are better designed to capture exclusionary behavior within otherwise relatively progressive social policy contexts.
Predicted levels of support for social closure within KE class (education).
Predicted levels of support for social closure within KE class (employment).
Discussion and Conclusion
Contemporary politics in Europe are to a large degree defined by an educational cleavage dividing knowledge economy losers from winners. Although scholars have extensively explored how status losses give rise to a far-right turn among voters without university degrees, there has been significantly less scrutiny of the role of status considerations among the highly educated. Instead, their progressivism is often taken as evidence that they feel relatively secure about their position in a changing society and its prospects in the future.
However, although the status gains of historically marginalized groups over the last half-century were in part the result of decades-long progressive efforts to advance social and economic justice, this does not prevent these gains from becoming a source of concern for progressive voters. More specifically, the transformation of status hierarchies in Europe, I argue, matters for understanding how and why winners vary in the intensity of their commitments to progressivism. This variation is of critical importance as the requirements for continued sociocultural and economic progress only grow steeper and affluent, highly educated groups strive to keep pace with rising competition in contemporary knowledge economies.
To underline the importance of exploring this variation more systematically, I made two analytical propositions with regard to the study of progressive attitudes and electorates. After illustrating some of the analytical limitations of unbundling sociocultural and economic issues, I drew on a literature examining status loss among knowledge economy losers to show how, when faced with the status implications that arise at the interactions of these issues, there are numerous reasons to expect some members of the KE class to hold less progressive attitudes than their peers. Applying this to the issue of immigration, I argued that, in contexts where status hierarchies are less ethnoracially stratified, members of the KE class adopt a politics of status preservation that opposes immigration and redistribution and favors policies that facilitate social closure.
The results of my exploratory analyses offer preliminary support for these hypotheses. I find that, in regions where ethnoracial minorities are better represented in higher-status positions, members of the KE class are more opposed to immigration and redistribution and more supportive of policies that facilitate social closure. Meanwhile, in regions where ethnoracial minorities are overrepresented in lower-status positions, members of the KE class are more supportive of immigration and redistribution and more opposed to policies that facilitate social closure. These findings echo recent studies revealing that anti-immigrant sentiments are not limited to or even dominant within the working class (Bolet Reference Bolet2020; Halikiopoulou and Vlandas Reference Halikiopoulou and Vlandas2022; Iversen and Soskice Reference Iversen and Soskice2019; Magni Reference Magni2022; Pardos-Prado and Xena Reference Pardos-Prado and Xena2019; Rueda Reference Rueda2018), as well as work examining opposition to gender equality efforts among the highly educated (Anduiza and Rico Reference Anduiza and Rico2024; Rettl et al. Reference Rettl, Bolet, De Vries, Cremaschi, Abou-Chadi and Pardos-Prado2024). Furthermore, these findings illustrate the importance of viewing the material interests of the KE class not as isolated from but rather linked to their long-term status expectations (Häusermann, Kurer, and Zollinger Reference Häusermann, Kurer and Zollinger2023).
More broadly, as an initial test of the theoretical framework I presented, these findings carry implications for the future study of progressive politics in Europe. First, although some progressive voters may successfully separate their positions on social and economic issues in some contexts, more work has to be done to examine how advantaged voters reconcile the trade-offs that inevitably arise when sociocultural progress requires profound economic change: What position takes priority, and how do they choose which to prioritize? Addressing such questions is important for future politics surrounding not only immigration and ethnoracial equality but also gender equality, climate change, trans rights, and other facets of social life where there is still scope for more justice. Second, although the KE class has experienced gains in relative terms, this does not keep some of its members from growing concerned about status preservation in the long term, especially in contexts where they consider the status gains of historically marginalized groups as sufficient. Finally, although I provided preliminary evidence that status matters for progressive electorates, future research should directly examine the attitudinal mechanisms I proposed, among others. In short, knowledge economy winners vary in the intensity of their progressivism and in their status concerns, and this variation should be explored much more systematically. My theoretical framework offers one path to beginning such explorations.
There are numerous limitations to the empirical analysis. The data are observational and cross sectional, and thus the findings do not serve as evidence that the status gains of ethnoracial minorities directly shape beliefs and attitudes among members of the KE class. The results only support an association between the regional status position of ethnoracial minorities and views on immigration, government intervention, and social policy. In relying on a cross-sectional measure to represent the gradual accumulation of status advancements over decades, the analysis thus only offers an indirect test of the theoretical claims. Furthermore, the survey items I use to measure support for immigration, redistribution, and exclusionary social policies are limited in their ability to capture the complexities that arise at the intersection of economic and sociocultural issues, especially those specific to a region and its particular pattern of economic and sociocultural change. Future research should work to develop and refine survey items and status measures that can better capture the array of localized factors shaping ebbs and flows in progressive attitudes and their links to a politics of status preservation.
Although I highlight within-group variation based on observational data, rather than the causal effects of demographic or status changes, the data and methods are well suited to my aim of prompting further reflection: How does the transformation of status hierarchies shape commitments to progressive causes within the KE class? The patterns of interest here evolve incrementally over time, influenced by the interaction of gradual demographic change and the oscillating tide of public debates over inequality, immigration, and social policy. Even if the KE class remains more progressive than other electorates, there are changes unfolding at the margins that carry profound implications for the study of progressive politics in Europe. These changes are especially pertinent for future research on the politics of inequality, because the findings suggest that opposition to egalitarian measures due to material interests is ultimately inseparable from opposition rooted in cultural change. Gains and losses are seldom experienced on only one dimension, and it is this interdependence that makes the continued pursuit of equality a multifront effort.
Supplementary material
To view supplementary material for this article, please visit http://doi.org/10.1017/S1537592725101461.
Acknowledgments
I thank my doctoral advisers Peter A. Hall, Torben Iversen, and Kathleen Thelen for their feedback and support of this project, as well as funding from the Minda de Gunzburg Center for European Studies at Harvard University, Leiden University, and the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG German Research Foundation) under Germany’s Excellence Strategy EXC-2035/1–390681379. Thank you also to Alex Mierke-Zatwarnicki, Alexander Kuo, Anna-Lena Nadler, Daniel Alves Fernandes, Daniel Roberts, Delia Zollinger, Helen Zhang, Lars van Doorn, Luis Cornado Bonal, Noah Daponte-Smith, Sophie Hill, Sun Young Park, and participants in the CIS Colloquium in Zürich, the 2023 APSA conference, and the LSE Status Politics workshop for their comments and contributions.
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