Justice in Labor Immigration Policy

Abstract

I provide an alternative to the two prevailing accounts of justice in immigration policy, the free migration view and the state discretion view. Against the background of an internationalist conception of domestic and global justice that grounds special duties of justice between co-citizens in their shared participation in a distinctive scheme of social cooperation, I defend three principles of justice to guide labor immigration policy: the Difference Principle, the Duty of Beneficence, and the Duty of Assistance. I suggest how these principles are to be applied in both ideal and nonideal circumstances. Finally, I argue that the potential conflict between these principles has often been overstated, and propose priority rules for genuine cases of conflict.

Pluralist internationalism, global justice and international student recruitment in the UK

“…The framework is wide-ranging, and elements of it have been applied broadly by Risse and others (e.g. Risse & Wollner, 2019;Yong, 2016) to issues such as labour rights, labour migration, natural resource distribution, climate change and global trade. The implications of the realisation of Risse's conception of global justice appear far-reaching: States would act responsibly towards future generations with regards to resource stewardship and climate change and ensure that the benefits of the global trade would be distributed more equitably, as examples.…”

“…The aim is that all of the measures taken by the UK together fulfil the duty of assistance, and practices related to international education may or may not be part of this. Thus, any proposal for measures to alleviate injustices should be assessed in terms of its effectiveness when compared to other measures (Yong, 2016). In addition, I take a view similar to that of Sen (1999), who emphasizes that recipients must be active participants in the process of assistance.…”

“…If the overall effect of outbound student mobility is damaging to the source country, targeted immigration restrictions may be required. Yong (2016) suggests that in the case of medical brain drain, countries that possess 'minimally just institutions' would be required to apply targeted immigration restrictions to minimise medical brain drain from other states. In addition, the recipient state, bound by a duty to aid in the development of minimally just institutions resulting from shared membership of global order, should help to address the institutional deficits which cause the brain drain in the first place through cooperation with the recipient.…”

Cities, selective admission, and economic sorting

“…The first is that those who share membership in a state are subject to a particular form of coercion and are expected to participate in a certain and extensive form of cooperation. Co-membership in a state is a morally significant relation that grounds special principles of justice; these principles of justice demand equal protection for basic rights, equality of opportunity, and limits on economic inequalities among co-citizens (Risse, 2017: 44; Yong, 2016: 823–824). The second reason is related to the fact that cities are societal resources.…”