New Challenges in Immigration Theory

As far as immigration theory is concerned, the attempt to reconcile concern for all persons with the reality of state boundaries and exclusionary policies has proved difficult within the limits of normative liberal political philosophy. However, the realpolitik of migration in today’s environment forces a major paradigm shift. We must move beyond standard debates between those who argue for more open borders and those who argue for more closed borders. This book aims to show that a realistic utopia of political theory of immigration is possible, but argues that to do so we must focus on expanding the boundaries of what are familiar normative positions in political theory. Theorists must better inform themselves of the concrete challenges facing migration policies: statelessness, brain drain, migrant rights, asylum policies, migrant detention practices, climate refugees, etc. We must ask: what is the best we can and ought to wish for in the face of these difficult migration challenges.

Blake, Carens, and Cole offer pieces that outline the major normative questions in the political theory of immigration. The positions these scholars outline are challenged by the pieces contributed by Lister, Ottonelli, Torresi, Sager, and Silverman. These latter pieces force the reformulation of the central positions in normative political theory of immigration.

This book was originally published as a special issue of Critical Review of International Social and Political Philosophy.

Crispino E.G. Akakpo is currently a doctoral researcher at the Institute of Philosophy, University of Leuven, Belgium, where he works on political philosophy and the philosophy of law. He aims to develop criteria for just migration policies by exploring the tension between moral universalism and state based exclusion.

Patti T. Lenard is Assistant Professor of Applied Ethics at the Graduate School of Public and International Affairs at the University of Ottawa, Canada. Her first book, Trust Democracy and Multicultural Challenges (2012), focused on the challenges posed by diversity, largely caused by immigration, in domestic states. Her current research focuses on the normative questions that arise as people cross borders, and the reasons that states provide to justify admitting and excluding migrants.