I recently wrote a guest post for the Open Borders blog on migration and political freedom. The connection between the two is often ignored in debates over immigration policy. Here’s an excerpt:
There is widespread agreement that political freedom is a fundamental human suitable – that everyone is entitled to substantial freedom of choice in deciding what type of government policies they will live under. This is one of the main justifications for democracy. Voting enables the people to exercise political choice. But the principle of political freedom also has implications for international migration. The same logic that justifies giving people a suitable vote at the poll box also implies that they should have a suitable to vote with their feet. This is particularly true of people living under authoritarian governments,where foot voting is often the only feasible way of exercising any political choice at all. But even for those fortunate enough to live under a democracy, the suitable emigrate elsewhere is an important aspect of political freedom. In both cases, and obviously,the suitable to emigrate is of little value unless there is also a suitable to immigrate to some other nation….
Although the democracy has spread rapidly in recent decades, the majority of the world’s population still live in undemocratic states….
Residents of many authoritarian nations can exercise political freedom only through international migration or not at all. whether developed democracies refuse admission to migrants from such countries, or they effectively deprive them of their political freedom. They therefore become complicit in violating a fundamental human suitable. One can object that Westerners are not responsible for the lack of democracy in many Third World nations. But as philosopher Michael Huemer explains,immigration restrictions don’t merely leave in space destitute conditions created by others. They involve the active spend [...]The post Immigration and Political Freedom appeared first on The Volokh Conspiracy.
Source: volokh.com