by Colin Michael Bolton
Endeared as the great humanitarian and poet of democracy, Walt Whitman wholeheartedly embraced immigration: “Restrict nothing—keep everything open: to Italy, to China, to anybody.” World history, as Whitman would have agreed, is the story of human dislocation and movement. Mankind’s humble beginnings are rooted in the nomadic lifestyle, with our ancestors having traversed the expanse of modern-day Africa and Asia nearly two millennia ago. However, with the unmitigated rise of nationalism today, national borders are becoming more impenetrable. Worse still, the interminable pandemic has stifled a decade’s worth of progress and growth in immigration. Invariably, whenever immigration is discussed, it is often in the context of stiffening or adding more restrictions. Are we in the throes of a reactionary backlash to decades of openness? Are we succumbing to a primitive psychological setting in which we perceive opportunities as a zero-sum game? Perhaps both. In the ensuing discussion, I would like to call attention to the definitional ambiguities of an immigrant and to unequivocally endorse an open and unfettered society.
Borders and the Barometer of Openness
It might be relevant to preface this argument with some historical context. In ancient Athens, the intellectual bastion of Western antiquity, we see Athens’ foreign policy as articulated by Pericles:
“We throw open our city to the world and never by alien acts exclude foreigners from any opportunity of learning or observing although the eyes of an enemy may occasionally profit by our liberality.”
Of course, this might have been a boast on the part of Pericles–Athens welcomed droves of visitors but none of them were offered citizenship. At the pinnacle of the Roman empire, emperors welcomed immigrants to grow the military and labour force. Roman elites, however, reserved much disdain for immigrants. Between the 17th and 19th century, 240,000 Europeans and a staggering 10.7 million Africans arrived on American soil. America branded itself as “land of the free” but it instead branded slaves and withheld citizenship and other fundamental rights from the disenfranchised latter. On this changing complexion of society, the beloved and democratic Whitman rallied Americans to embrace “the composite American identity of the future.” Fast forward to the twentieth century, political philosopher Karl Popper championed a tolerant society:
“…if we are not prepared to defend a tolerant society against the onslaught of the intolerant, then the tolerant will be destroyed, and tolerance with them.”
Popper impressed the need for constant cultural gatekeeping in order to preserve ideological neutrality and objectivity in society. Through this brief tour of history, it is evident that societal openness is a shifting needle.
Immigrants and Identity Politics
Before the coinage of ‘immigrant’, travellers to a foreign place were called ‘emigrants’, or ‘migrants’. To emigrate was “to remove from place to place.” This was distinctly similar to the definition of immigration: “to remove into a country.” In both definitions, the emigrant and the (im)migrant were chiefly defined by their decision to leave. In 1928, the lexicographer Noah Webster (of Merriam-Webster dictionary) made the definition of immigration more nuanced through the following revision: “to remove into a country for the purpose of permanent residence.” Quite notably, Webster made space, time, and the purpose of the traveller the definitive characteristics–a standard that later became ubiquitous in every other American English dictionary. Without knowing it, Noah Webster introduced a paradigm change at a moment when nationality became inextricably linked to a person’s identity. Some people belonged. Others did not. As historian Neil Shumsky notes, Webster’s 1928 revision had unwittingly laid out the terms of the immigration debate:
“By telling Americans that immigration involves coming from another country, Webster set up an us-versus-them opposition, foreigner against native-born. By telling Americans that immigration is permanent and involves the intent of residence, Webster encouraged them to fear that in time they might be displaced, their cities overrun and their jobs jeopardized.”
Today, we see the lasting effects of Webster’s revised definition, as adopted by the United Nations (UN). The UN defines an immigrant as someone who has lived outside his or her country of nationality for one year. This definition is tethered to a timeline–a rather arbitrary determinant. Such a pliant condition would exclude visitors who stayed for a period of 364 days but include those that stayed for 366 days. Since duration is not a naturalistic trait, there is no physical difference between an immigrant and a native. Should natives hoard wealth and opportunities because they won the cosmic lottery of being born in a first-world nation? Should one’s geographical bearings limit one’s prospects? Any moral person would be hard-pressed to argue that either should.
What is particularly worrisome about the issue of immigration is its vulnerability to the pernicious effects of politicking. Politicians can inflate the numbers and falsely declare an immigration crisis. This manipulation of immigration statistics can stoke nationalism and garner political support where needed. In the Trump administration, the government proliferated the use of “alien” in U.S. immigration law to refer to prospective immigrants. This was a conscious attempt at “othering”, perpetuating illusory differences and fictional harms on the host society. Such political ploys are destructive and have historically proven to shrink the economy and cultural landscape.
Reframing the Border
Having an open society is necessary for the functioning and maintenance of liberal democracies. We need to see national borders not as fixed hurdles, but as an evolving construction with merits and demerits that must be constantly reweighed. Politicians should be mindful that border restrictions tend to affect those within more than those without. These draconian measures simply do not hedge against any perceived drawbacks of globalisation. The local culture and the economy are both better off with a steady stream of new talents and capital investments. At the end of the day, borders should not demarcate limitations but should be launchpads into new, exciting vistas for people to pursue more favourable living prospects.
References:
Erickson, Amanda. “The 1829 Dictionary Entry That Reshaped How Americans Think About Immigrants”. The Washington Post, 2018, https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/worldviews/wp/2018/01/18/people-used-to-move-heres-how-that-changed-and-why-they-became-immigrants-instead/. Accessed 7 Mar 2021.
Popper, Karl R. The open society and its enemies. Vol. 119. Princeton University Press, 2020.
Shumsky, Neil Larry. “Noah Webster and the Invention of Immigration.” The New England Quarterly, vol. 81, no. 1, 2008, pp. 126–135. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/20474606. Accessed 7 Mar. 2021.
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