Labour’s Shadow
Chancellor has been strongly attacked
by his own side for suggesting
that the world is moving inexorably towards open borders. It’s another sad reflection, considering the
internationalist idealism of the founders of the Labour Party, that those
arguing for open borders are regarded as aberrant, whilst those arguing for
controls over the free movement of people are regarded as mainstream. It’s perfectly possible, of course, that
those supporting strong borders are merely reflecting what they see as being
the opinion of the electorate – but that’s an even sadder reflection on the
state of the modern Labour Party and how far it has strayed from its early
ideals. And pandering to conventional
opinion rather than being willing to challenge it serves only to strengthen it.
In the
circumstances, suggesting that open borders are the way of the future was a
brave statement by John McDonnell. I
think he’s actually right. The world is
changing around us in ways which not everyone will like; but not liking
something doesn’t mean it won’t happen.
In particular, modern communications technology makes it easier for
people to compare and contrast their own way of life with that elsewhere. It’s too easy to see the refugee crisis as a
product of war or famine alone. Whilst
those are certainly factors, concentrating too heavily on those ignores the
wider economic issues leading to large scale migration.
‘Economic
migrants’, as governments like to refer to them, are ‘merely’ escaping poverty,
rather than death through famine or war; but poverty causes death too. It can be slower and less dramatic, but
poverty – even relative poverty – affects longevity as well. And there can be no doubting the disparity in
the quality of life between the rich countries and the poor. It is surely entirely understandable that
people seeing a better quality of life elsewhere will attempt to seek it out,
rather than accept their current state.
Of course,
whilst modern communications make the disparities more visible, and the
comparative ease of travel (compared to the situation just a few decades ago)
facilitates greater mobility, neither of those is the underlying cause of the
disparity. That comes down to centuries
of differential rates of economic development; and we should never forget that
the greater pace of development in the richer parts of the world was for a very
long time underpinned by exploiting the resources of the rest. The whole history of colonialism and
capitalism is about the transfer of wealth from some areas to others. In this case, I’m talking about the richer
and poorer countries across the world, but similar processes have also operated
internally within the richer countries.
Add in the
likely effects of a changing climate, and we are going to see even more mass
migration in the future, and people ignoring borders in the process. There are two potential responses to the
situation. The first is the stance taken
by conventional politicians, which is all about building fences and obstacles,
pulling up the drawbridge as it were, to stop people moving around. That’s proving hard enough now. If the numbers continue to grow, it is likely
to become unsustainable without resorting to the increasing use of force. The other is the stance taken by McDonnell,
which is that we need to start thinking about the consequences and how we
prepare for them.
It’s not an
easy or a comfortable question to be asking ourselves. How do we protect and sustain accepted
cultures and customs if the population demographic is changing? How do we deal with the economic and social
consequences? Being afraid, for whatever
reason, to even ask such questions is part of the problem, but the result –
trying to pretend that we can continue to hoard wealth in some parts of the
world whilst denying it to others – simply won’t work for very long. If the critics of McDonnell succeed in
silencing debate on the question, we’ll all be the losers in the longer term.
Posts
