States combine the routine refusal of citizenship to migrants with policies that grant newborns of citizens (or residents) full membership of society without questions asked. This paper asks what, if anything, can justify this differential treatment of the two types of newcomers. It explores arguments for differential treatment based on the differential environmental impact, different impact on the (political) culture of the society in question and differences between the positions of the newcomers themselves. I conclude that, although some justification for (...) differential treatment exists, the case for it is weaker than one may expect and the grounds on which it can be justified are surprising and problematic. (shrink)

Over the last few years, an increasingly sophisticated literature devoted to normative questions arising out of the enforcement of immigration law had developed. In this essay, I consider what sorts of constraints considerations of justice and legitimacy may place on the enforcement of immigration law, even if we assume that states have significant discretion in setting their own immigration policies, and that open borders are not required by justice. I consider constraints placed on state or national governments, constraints on enforcement (...) by substate governments, and constraints on the actions of individuals. I show that there are significant limits on what states may do and what they may require substate governments and individuals to do, in enforcing their immigration laws, but that these constraints are not clearly incompatible with significant state discretion in setting immigration policy. Nonetheless, consideration of justice in enforcement is necessary for any complete normative account of immigration. (shrink)

When the brothers Hakob, 13, and Hasmik, 14, had lived in Sweden for 5 years, their applications for residence were rejected, and they were to be deported to Armenia (Dagens Nyheter March 8, 2007,...

What legal rights and duties immigrants should have is among the most ferociously debated topics in the politics of liberal societies today. However, as this article will show, there is remarkably little disagreement of great magnitude among political theorists and philosophers of immigration on the rights and duties of resident immigrants (even in contrast to the closely related philosophical discussion of justice in immigrant admissions). Specifically, this article will survey philosophical positions both on what legal rights immigrants (documented permanent residents, (...) guestworkers, and undocumented immigrants) ought to have (including to citizenship and against deportation), and on what liberal societies may justly do to require immigrants to integrate. This article will reveal that there is a substantial, growing gap between contemporary politics worldwide and what the moral norms of liberalism seem to entail concerning the rights and duties of immigrants. (shrink)

Can a liberal state exclude illiberal immigrants in order to preserve its liberal status? Hrishikesh Joshi has argued that liberalism cannot require a commitment to open borders because this would entail that liberalism is committed to its own demise in circumstances in which many illiberal immigrants aim to immigrate into a liberal society. I argue that liberalism is committed to its own demise in certain circumstances, but that this is not as bad as it may appear. Liberalism’s commitment to its (...) own demise is merely a reflection of the fact that it must take into account the rights of outsiders, not just the rights of existing citizens, and of the fact that circumstances of injustice can sometimes leave liberal societies with no correct choice. (shrink)