Zero-Sum Thinking and the Cultural Threat of Muslim Religious Rights
2025-08-20
Cultural threat is one of the main explanations for opposing immigrants. However, it lacks theoretical precision and suffers from measurement issues. To remedy these problems, we conceptualize cultural threat as a zero-sum problem and specify concrete cultural rights that Muslims receive. In two online experiments in Germany, we randomly assigned people to situations where Muslim cultural rights either replace majority rights (zero-sum) or they co-exist (non-zero-sum). The willingness to accommodate Muslims’ cultural rights varies strongly by the logic of cultural threat, especially for respondents with an inclusionary mindset. They are protective of their own cultural practices, but do not perceive all gains in Muslim rights as inherently threatening. Respondents with an exclusionary mindset, however, respond less to variations in cultural threat. In contrast to people with an inclusionary mindset, they also react more negatively to Muslim than non-Muslim demands for change.