Abstract
Aside from the case of refugees under international law, are non-citizen outsiders morally justified in unlawfully entering another state? Recent answers to this question, based on a purported right of necessity or civil disobedience, exclude many cases of justified border-crossing and fail to account for its distinctive political character. I argue that in certain non-humanitarian cases, unlawful border-crossing involves the exercise of a remedial moral right to resist the illegitimate exercise of coercive power. The case accepts, for the sake of argument, two conventional assumptions among defenders of immigration restrictions: that states have a ‘right to exclude’ and that migrants have a prima facie duty to respect borders. Nonetheless, where immigration law is racist or otherwise discriminatory, it violates the egalitarian standards at the core of any authority it can plausibly claim over outsiders. In such cases, it may be resisted even where the law is facially non-discriminatory.
Highlights
Aside from the case of refugees under international law, are non-citizen outsiders morally justified in unlawfully entering another state? Recent answers to this question, based on a purported right of necessity or civil disobedience, exclude many cases of justified border-crossing and fail to account for its distinctive political character
Aside from the case of refugees fleeing persecution, whose special claims are recognised in law, is it justified to unlawfully enter another state? Do non-citizen outsiders have duties to respect the immigration laws of a foreign state? Is there a moral right to cross borders and, if so, what is the grounds for such a right given it is not found in international law?
This is the case where exclusionary immigration law is the product of a political process that fails to show due regard for the equal moral status of would-be migrants due to the influence of overt and covert form of discrimination
Summary
Aside from the case of refugees under international law, are non-citizen outsiders morally justified in unlawfully entering another state? Recent answers to this question, based on a purported right of necessity or civil disobedience, exclude many cases of justified border-crossing and fail to account for its distinctive political character. Do non-citizen outsiders have duties to respect the immigration laws of a foreign state?
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