Structural Modeling of Cultural, Social, and Political Factors Affecting Inter-Ethnic Convergence in Ahvaz

Iran is a multi-ethnic country and this has made paying attention to ethnic issues always one of the concerns of policy-makers and officials. Paying attention to the issue of race and ethnicity can be considered in different frameworks. Some experts see ethnic diversity as a threat and some see it as an opportunity and hence, the convergence of ethnic groups. Iran is a country that includes many ethnic groups with very different sub-cultures. On the one hand, it has created a very rich cultural context and on the other hand, it has created disputes and conflicts among different ethnic groups in some cases. Integration is effective in providing national unity and ethnic integration can be strengthened by policy. Considering that a large population of Ahvaz City consists of the two ethnic groups of Arabs and Bakhtiaris and that no independent research has been done to investigate inter-ethnic integration in this city so far, it was necessary to conduct a research and investigate this issue among the mentioned groups living in this city. The present study was carried out to investigate the factors affecting inter-ethnic integration in the city of Ahvaz. In this research, the variables of cultural capital, legalism, sense of social belonging, social trust, ethnocentrism, and the amount of using mass media were used as the independent variables. Then, the following question was raised: To what extent could these variables have an effect on inter-ethnic convergence in Ahvaz City?

This research was based on a survey method and the data collection tool was a questionnaire. The statistical population included people over 16 years of age from both Bakhtiari and Arab tribes living in Ahvaz City. The sample size was determined to be 384 people based on the Cochran formula. A standard questionnaire was used to collect the data. The structural equation modeling was utilized for confirming the validity and reliability of the research variables. The results of the measurement model showed that the indicators had favorable levels of validity and reliability. 

The findings of this study indicated the significant effects of the research variables on the level of inter-ethnic convergence among the respondents. According to the results, the influences of the variables of cultural capital, legalism, amount of using mass media, social trust, sense of social belonging, and ethnocentrism had the values of 0.327, 0.312, 0.256, 0.185, 0.114, and -0.187, respectively. According to these significant figures, it could be concluded that the research hypotheses were confirmed in the structural model. Therefore, the effects of the mentioned variables on the inter-ethnic integration stated by the respondents were corroborated. The results of the structural equation modeling also revealed the effects of the variables of cultural capital, legalism, amount of using mass media, social trust, sense of social belonging, and ethnocentrism on the variable of inter-ethnic convergence, respectively. In addition, the research variables were able to explain 44.2% of changes in the variable of inter-ethnic convergence.Finally, the results of the research demonstrated that the level of this convergence could be enhanced by increasing the levels of social trust, sense of social belonging, cultural capital, tendency towards legalism, and amount of using mass media and decreasing the level of ethnocentrism among the respondents.