Australia border policy; tribal or human

Imagine if the citizens of a wealthy Australian city such as Sydney decided to erect a barrier to stop other Australians entering. Imagine also that Sydney set up detention camps where people attempting to get in were detained indefinitely, with some allowed entry but others deemed “economic migrants” and denounced for their greed.

Outrage and condemnation would surely pour forth from the rest of Australia. The Sydney people would inevitably be accused of putting themselves ahead of their fellow Australians. There would be cries of how dare they treat their fellow Australians this way, especially those who are suffering and struggling to build a better life for their families. The Sydney people would be accused of denying their fellow Australians a fair go.

Such terrible behaviour seems impossible to us, but this is how our fellow human beings are being treated as Australia pursues its current border control policy. The Oceanic Viking affair offers the most recent example of Australia’s attempts to keep people out.

Why is it alright to treat our fellow human beings this way, when we would never do the same to our fellow Australians?

Why do people deserve fewer rights than us just because of where they were born?

Why are Australians more deserving of a fair go than other human beings?

The answer to all of these questions is that all human beings deserve to be treated with basic dignity, and this basic dignity includes the right to freedom of movement.

But if what Australia is doing is not alright, what should we do?

Many people will say that open borders and freedom of movement are simply impossible to put into practice, and that were we to open our borders we would simply be swamped by refugees and our society would collapse; benefiting no one.

Whether or not an open border policy would have such an effect, it is important to realise that framing the question as one where the only options are the current situation or the chaos of an immediate move to open borders obscures rather than illuminates the solution.

The choice is not between either maintaining the world as it is or instantly opening national borders. The choice is between doing nothing or starting to move beyond the tribalism of the age of nation states in which we currently live. If we start work to build a more integrated world based on principles such as democracy and human rights we will over time be able to increase freedom of movement around the world. Moving beyond our tribal approach to such issues as freedom of movement does not mean instantly throwing our borders open to all. It means taking the steps to build a global political system that enables our common humanity to start transcending our tribal national identities, making possible in the future a higher degree of freedom of movement between states.

Now, again, I realise that many readers will say such a development is impossible. But just as every other step of progress in human history was decried as impossible until it happened, so it will be with the movement to build a globalised political system based on respect for our common humanity to accompany our globalised economy.

What this political system will look like no one can predict precisely. A possible model is the European Union (EU) which, although it too does not offer an open border to non Europeans, has at least offered more open borders to citizens of its member countries. A Human Union may slowly develop to offer similar possibilities to all humans.

The EU model for a future Human Union makes more sense than the United Nations (UN) model. The UN does not require a basic degree of respect for human rights and democracy from its members and so contains both democracies and dictatorships and has failed to develop common values and standards among its members the way the EU has. A future Human Union would evolve slowly, gradually adding members as they came to share it basic common values.

How does this future possibility relate to the question of freedom of movement now?

We cannot build a Human Union overnight. But if all we do is support the status quo of the age of nationalism by denying the legitimate aspirations of our fellow human beings to a better life by restricting their freedom of movement we are simply supporting the worst possible option. If Australia was to take even a small step to start the building of a future Human Union or World Federation we could at least say that Australia is working its way towards a position that is fair to all humans rather than its current one of discrimination against those less fortunate.

It may take a hundred years to steadily build a Human Union. But every year that we do not even start the process we are not being “realistic”, instead we are simply delaying a necessary and sensible reform, while our fellow humans continue to suffer.

Australian Prime Minister Rudd has proposed an “Asian Community”, open to all apparently, whether democracy or dictatorship. Why not propose a Human or World Union, open to all democratically inclined countries, a Human Union which could start to gradually build a world of open borders. Such a Human Union may start with only one or two member countries, but over time it could grow. This would not necessarily help the people struggling to come to Australia today, but it would set in train a process which would help everybody in the future.

If Australia were to propose such an organisation, or seek others to join the initial nucleus of such an organisation, Australia would be making a genuine contribution to dealing with the problem of asylum seekers rather than simply guarding its tribal privileges against less fortunate fellow humans.

Instead of perpetuating the suffering of our fellow humans by denying them freedom of movement it would be more rational and just for Australia to declare that it will start helping to build a world where our fellow humans have freedom of movement. By exploring how to build a world that puts human dignity before the tribal privileges of the age of nationalism Australia can be part of the solution rather than just the defender of the status quo.