X-Sphere Conversations About the Sustainable Cohesion of Refugee and Migrant Communities in Türkiye

This study focuses on Turkish citizens’ opinions on and attitudes toward refugees and migrants on X (formerly Twitter) between June and July 2022, a period of increased immigration-related news coverage in Türkiye. Specifically, we ask which sustainable-cohesion-related themes and attitudes prevail on the platform and how these discourses vary across distinct refugee and migrant populations. To address this, qualitative content analysis was conducted on the most popular posts ( N  = 89) to capture views on the sustainable cohesion of refugees and migrants, specifically granting citizenship, allowing permanent residency, employment, development, and future projections. Our findings show that (a) only a small portion of tweets include references to sustainable-cohesion-related themes, containing mostly negative attitudes, and (b) opinions and attitudes differ by refugee and migrant group (Syrians, Afghans, Ukrainians). We reveal that sustainable-cohesion-related themes used by the government feature on X-sphere, yet they are contested to push counter-arguments and promote strong anti-refugee opinions and attitudes. This further reflects negative public sentiment on, skepticism of, and discontent with outsiders, echoing realistic-group-conflict theory, which views immigrant and refugee influxes as instigators of perceptions of economic and social threats. The research contributes to the literature on the influence of political actors on social media, highlighting their potential to shape public opinion and sentiment regarding political issues.