Vincenzo Bove has published a column on VoxEU summarising his recent research on immigration, fear of crime, and public spending on security. Using data on more than 8,000 Italian municipalities from 2003 to 2015, the study finds that immigration led to increased spending on police due not to higher crime rates but to unfounded fears of criminality. The relation between immigration and municipal spending on police protection was particularly pronounced for immigrants from culturally distant societies.

The column is available here: https://voxeu.org/article/immigration-fear-and-public-spending-security