Recent immigrants, earlier immigrants and the Canadian-born : Immigrants récents, immigrants antérieurs et natifs du Canada : association aux identites collectives

The Black population is found to express the lowest rates of identifying as a citizen of Canada and as a citizen of their province. [...] Due to the increase in the ethno-cultural and linguistic diversity of immigrants to Canada over the past 15 years2, the degree to which immigrants identify as a citizen of Canada and as a member of their local community may prove to be particularly significant. [...] Their findings reveal that 88% of second generation Canadians reported their sense of belonging as strong (rating of four or five out of five), compared to 81% of first generation immigrants and 79% of the general population; while 71% of second generation Canadians indicated that their sense of belonging was very strong (rating of five out of five), compared to 58% of first generation Canadians a [...] According to the results, immigrants reported a stronger sense of belonging to Canada than the Canadian-born population: 85.6%4 of the Canadian-born reported a strong sense of belonging to Canada, as did 93.0% of established immigrants5, 91.0% of those who immigrated between 1980 and 1990, and 87.6% of those who immigrated between 1991 and 2003 (Schellenberg 2004a). [...] The WVS data indicates that recent immigrants, earlier immigrants, and the Canadian-born collectively express high levels of positive identification as a citizen of Canada, as a citizen of their province/region, and as a citizen of their community (see Figure 4-1 and Figure 4-2).