The Duty to Disobey Immigration Law

Abstract

Many political theorists argue that immigration restrictions are unjust and defend broadly open borders. In this paper, I examine the implications of this view for individual conduct. In particular, I argue that the citizens of states that enforce unjust immigration restrictions have duties to disobey certain immigration laws. States conscript their citizens to help enforce immigration law by imposing legal duties on these citizens to monitor, report, and refrain from interacting with unauthorized migrants. If an ideal of open borders is true, these laws are unjust. Furthermore, if citizens comply with their legal duties, they contribute to violating the rights of migrants. We are obligated to refrain from contributing to rights-violations. So, citizens are obligated to disobey immigration laws. I defend the moral requirement to disobey immigration laws against the objection that disobedience to the law is excessively risky and the objection that citizens have political obligations to obey the law.

Democratic Legitimacy and Coercively Enforced Borders: Assessing the Argument of Arash Abizadeh

“…Concomitantly, Abizadeh's argument grants all individuals the moral allowance to disregard and potentially resist all coercive border laws (Miller, 2010, p. 111). This differs from the more qualified approach of Javier Hidalgo, who defends the right to resist and the duty to disobey "unjust" immigration laws, defined as those that prevent the entry of people whose human rights would be violated if they were not admitted, even though admission would not significantly harm members of the receiving state (Hidalgo, 2015(Hidalgo, , 2016. It even stands in tension with Abizadeh's later critique of "special-obligations arguments," a critique aimed specifically at "wealthier polities" that restrict immigration of absolutely or relatively poor immigrants from "globally poor regions" in order to improve the wellbeing of poorer people within wealthy states (Abizadeh, 2016, pp.…”

The Stakes of Sanctuary

“…In this latter case, the source of the need to provide sanctuary was twofold: fi rst, the sanctuary providers felt the United States should take responsibility for having participated in the conditions that generated refugees in the fi rst place, and second, the sanctuary providers felt the United States ought to take the responsibility for the refugees who arrived at US borders. Th e more recent, and general, variant on this justifi cation argues that the global refugee/asylum regime is so deeply fl awed that resistance is required by justice (Hidalgo 2016). Globally, states are making it more and more diffi cult for refugees to fi nd safety (Gibney 2006), and as a result, responsible citizens have a duty of justice to do what they can to combat locally unjust immigration/asylum policies.…”

Enforcing immigration law

“…Many states or substate governments also seek to have individuals help in the enforcement of immigration law, by making it a requirement to do normal activities such as rent an apartment, visit a doctor, open a bank account, or get married. As Hidalgo notes, this can be seen as a form of conscription of private parties into helping enforce immigration law (Hidalgo, ; see also Yeo, , for discussion of U.K. cases). What is problematic here is not requiring identification.…”

“…However, specific focus on the enforcement of immigration law, and the distinctive moral questions that this raises, is a relatively new development. Over the last few years, an increasingly sophisticated literature have developed looking at such topics as immigration detention (see, e.g., Silverman, ; Ryo & Peacock, ), the effect of immigration enforcement on citizens and authorized residents in a state (see, e.g., Carens, ; Mendoza, ; Reed‐Sandoval, ), obligations to obey immigration law (see, e.g., Hidalgo, ; Yong, ), and when resistance to it or civil disobedience is acceptable (see, e.g., Hidalgo, ; Bertram, ; Lister, ), among other topics. In this essay, I will look at a number of different questions relating to the enforcement of immigration law.…”

“…detention (see, e.g., Silverman, 2014;Ryo & Peacock, 2018), the effect of immigration enforcement on citizens and authorized residents in a state (see, e.g., Carens, 2013;Mendoza, 2017;Reed-Sandoval, 2020), obligations to obey immigration law (see, e.g., Hidalgo, 2016;Yong, 2018), and when resistance to it or civil disobedience is acceptable (see, e.g., Hidalgo, 2015;Bertram, 2018;Lister, 2018b), among other topics. In this essay, I will look at a number of different questions relating to the enforcement of immigration law.…”