Philosophical Justifications of State Power over Immigration

Author(s):  
Sarah Song

Chapter 3 turns to political theory to explore the normative foundations of the state’s power over immigration. It examines theories based on (1) the value of cultural and national identity, (2) the right to property, (3) freedom of association, and (4) freedom from unwanted obligations. The first three appeal to the value of collective self-determination. On the nationalist view, the fundamental imperative of immigration control is the preservation of culturally distinctive nations. The property argument derives the right of immigration control from the labor of citizens. The freedom-of-association argument regards citizens as parties to associations, such as marriage or a golf club, which have the right to refuse association with nonassociates. The freedom-from unwanted-obligations-argument does not directly engage with the idea of collective self-determination. I argue that each of these theories falls short of providing a convincing theory of state authority over immigration.

Author(s):  
Sarah Song

Public debate about immigration proceeds on the assumption that each country has the right to control its own borders. But what, if anything, justifies the modern state’s power over borders? This chapter provides an answer in three parts. First, it examines the earliest immigration law cases in U.S. history and finds that the leading theorist they rely upon falls short of providing adequate normative justification of the state’s right to control immigration. In the second part, it turns to contemporary political theory and philosophy, critically assessing three leading arguments for the state’s right to control immigration: (1) national identity, (2) freedom of association, and (3) ownership/property. The third and final section offers an alternative argument based on the requirements of democracy.


2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (1) ◽  
pp. 78
Author(s):  
Dardan Vuniqi

State is society’s need for the existence of an organized power, equipped with the right equipments of coercion and able to run the society, by imposing the choices that seem reasonable to them, through legal norms. State is an organization of state power; it is an organized power which imposes its will to all the society and has a whole mechanism to execute this will. The state realizes its functions through power, which is a mechanism to accomplish its relevant functions. The power’s concept is a social concept, which can be understood only as a relation between two subjects, between two wills. Power is the ability to impose an order, a rule and other’s behavior in case that he doesn’t apply voluntary the relevant norm, respectively the right. Using state power is related to creation and application, respectively the implementation of law. To understand state power better, we have to start from its overall character. So, we notice that in practice we encounter different kinds of powers: the family’s one, the school’s one, the health’s one, the religion’s, culture’s etc. The notion of powers can be understood as a report between two subjects, two wills. Power is an order for other’s behavior. Every power is some kind of liability, dependence from others. In the legal aspect, supremacy of state presents the constitutive – legislative form upon the powers that follow after it. Supremacy, respectively the prevalence, is stronger upon other powers in its territory. For example we take the highest state body, the parliament as a legislative body, where all other powers that come after it, like the executive and court’s one, are dependable on state’s central power. We can’t avoid the carriage of state’s sovereignty in the competences of different international organizations. Republic, based on ratified agreements for certain cases can overstep state’s power on international organizations. The people legitimate power and its bodies, by giving their votes for a mandate of governance (people’s verdict). It is true that we understand people’s sovereignty only as a quality of people, where with the word people we understand the entirety of citizens that live in a state. The sovereignty’s case actualizes especially to prove people’s right for self-determination until the disconnection that can be seen as national – state sovereignty. National sovereignty is the right of a nation for self-determination. Sovereignty’s cease happens when the monopoly of physical strength ceases as well, and this monopoly is won by another organization. A state can be ceased with the voluntary union of two or more states in a mutual state, or a state can be ceased from a federative state, where federal units win their independence. In this context we have to do with former USSR’s units, separated in some independent states, like Czechoslovakia unit that was separated in two independent states: in Czech Republic and Slovakia. Former Yugoslavia was separated from eight federal units, today from these federal units seven of them have won their independence and their international recognition, and the Republic of Kosovo is one amongst them. Every state power’s activity has legal effect inside the borders of a certain territory and inside this territory the people come under the relevant state’s power. Territorial expansion of state power is three dimensional. The first dimension includes the land inside a state’s borders, the second dimension includes the airspace upon the land and the third dimension includes water space. The airspace upon inside territorial waters is also a power upon people and the power is not universal, meaning that it doesn’t include all mankind. State territory is the space that’s under state’s sovereignty. It is an essential element for its existence. According to the author Juaraj Andrassy, state territory lies in land and water space inside the borders, land and water under this space and the air upon it. Coastal waters and air are considered as parts that belong to land area, because in every case they share her destiny. Exceptionally, according to the international right or international treaties, it is possible that in one certain state’s territory another state’s power can be used. In this case we have to do with the extraterritoriality of state power. The state extraterritoriality’s institute is connected to the concept of another state’s territory, where we have to do with diplomatic representatives of a foreign country, where in the buildings of these diplomatic representatives, the power of the current state is not used. These buildings, according to the international right, the diplomatic right, have territorial immunity and the relevant host state bodies don’t have any power. Regarding to inviolability, respectively within this case, we have two groups to mention: the real immunity and the personal immunity, which are connected with the extraterritoriality’s institute. Key words: Independence, Sovereignty, Preponderance, Prevalence, Territorial Expansion.


2020 ◽  
Vol 48 (3) ◽  
pp. 271-302 ◽  
Author(s):  
Desmond Jagmohan

This essay argues that Marcus Garvey held a constructivist theory of self-determination, one that saw nationalism and transnationalism as mutually necessary and reinforcing ideals. The argument proceeds in three steps. First it recovers Garvey’s transnationalist emphasis by looking at his intellectual debts to other diaspora struggles, namely political Zionism and Irish nationalism. Second it argues that Garvey held a constructivist view of national identity, which also grounds his argument that the black diaspora has a right to collective self-determination. Third it explicates Garvey’s further contention that the right to self-determination and the persistence of oppression give the African diaspora a pro tanto claim to an independent state, which he considered essential to vanquishing white supremacy and realizing collective self-rule.


Author(s):  
Sarah Song

Immigration and Democracy develops an intermediate ethical position on immigration between closed borders and open borders. It argues that states have the right to control borders, but this right is qualified by an obligation to assist those outside their borders. In democratic societies, the right of immigration control must also be exercised in ways that are consistent with democratic values. Part I explores the normative grounds of the modern state’s power over immigration found in US immigration law and in political theory. It argues for a qualified, not absolute, right of states to control immigration based on a particular interpretation of the value of collective self-determination. Part II considers the case for open borders. One argument for open borders rests on the demands of global distributive justice; another argument emphasizes the value of freedom of movement as a fundamental human right. The book argues that both arguments fall short of justifying open borders. Part III turns to consider the substance of immigration policy for democratic societies. What kind of immigration policies should democratic societies adopt? What is required is not closed borders or open borders but controlled borders and open doors. Open to whom? The interests of prospective migrants must be weighed against the interests of the political community. Specific chapters are devoted to refugees and other necessitous migrants, family-based immigration, temporary worker programs, discretionary admissions, and what is owed to noncitizen residents, including unauthorized migrants living in the territory of democratic states.


2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (2) ◽  
pp. 207-228
Author(s):  
Cheyney Ryan

AbstractIs there an intimate connection between nationalism and war? Does the right to national self-determination invariably lead to bellicose relations with others? These have been central concerns in the literature on nationalism and war. They have also been concerns of political thinkers/activists who have worried about these connections and have sought to fashion a conception of national identity free of its warlike proclivities. This essay explores the link of war, nationalism, and national self-determination with reference to the founding of the state of Israel. And it reflects on the views of Martin Buber whose writings on Zionism constantly engaged these questions in searching for a peace-oriented nationalism.


Author(s):  
Kirsten Brink Mosey

As part of a collective thinking project, article proposes that all Black Canadians move to Nova Scotia to set up a decolonial, anti-racist, non-patriarchal, abolitionist settlement. Recognizing the denial of the right to collective self-determination for Black Canadians, this article explores how Black Canadians can work in solidarity with Indigenous solidarity movements to correct the injustices of settler-colonialism. 


Author(s):  
Sarah Song

Chapter 4 advances an alternative justification for the state’s right to control immigration based on the idea of collective self-determination. Collective self-determination is the idea that a group of people should govern themselves. The chapter begins by discussing the meaning, role, and value of collective self-determination and then elaborates a conception of collective self-determination. It argues that the agent of collective self-determination is not a nation, joint owners of state institutions, or members of a voluntary association but “a people.” It then explores the connections between collective self-determination, territorial rights, and immigration control. It concludes by considering the distinctive requirements of democratic self-determination and its implications for immigration control in democratic societies.


2021 ◽  
Vol 35 (4) ◽  
pp. 515-525 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher Heath Wellman

AbstractThis essay critically assesses Anna Stilz's argument in Territorial Sovereignty: A Philosophical Exploration that legitimate states have a right to do wrong. I concede that individuals enjoy a claim against external interference when they commit suberogatory acts, but I deny that the right to do wrong extends to acts that would violate the rights of others. If this is correct, then one must do more than merely invoke an individual's right to do wrong if one hopes to vindicate a legitimate state's right to commit injustices. Of course, there may be distinctive features of legitimate states that explain why they enjoy moral protections that individuals lack, but I argue that the value of collective self-determination is not up to this task. And even if these arguments fail, self-determination would at most explain why legitimate states enjoy a right to commit injustices against their own citizens; it would provide them no moral protection when they violate the rights of outsiders.


2019 ◽  
pp. 89-118
Author(s):  
Anna Stilz

This chapter turns to the question of how a state might acquire legitimate territorial jurisdiction over a population of rightful occupants. What gives a state the right to rule a specific territory and group of people? I hold that a state has a right to rule a territory and population if and only if it: (i) protects certain essential private rights for all its subjects and respects these rights in outsiders and (ii) it reflects the shared will of its population as to how—and by whom—they should be ruled. To gain the right to rule, a state must serve the second and third core values that underpin the states system: basic justice and collective self-determination. The chapter offers a specific account of the interest in collective self-determination, which it calls “the political autonomy theory.”


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