Immigration Ethics: An Overview

Author: Daniel Weltman
Category: Social and Political Philosophy, Ethics, Philosophy of Law, Philosophy of Race
Word Count: 999

Nearly all countries make it hard for many non-citizens to enter. Depending on where you were born, it can be difficult or impossible to get permission to even visit many countries, let alone to move there permanently.

Are countries justified in excluding outsiders like this?

This essay explores some key competing philosophical arguments about whether it should be easier for people to immigrate to whatever country they would like.^[1]

1. Arguments for Exclusion

Few philosophers argue that countries can always exclude absolutely everyone: for example, almost every philosopher thinks that countries must accept refugees fleeing dangerous situations.

But many philosophers argue that countries often have a right to exclude immigrants.

One argument that countries have a right to exclude is that immigrants from different cultures may dilute or destroy a country’s culture. If a country has a right to preserve its culture, then this gives it a right to exclude immigrants who do not share that culture.^[2]

A second argument in defense of the right to exclude immigrants is based on the idea that it is good for countries to have social welfare programs like socialized health care or strong unemployment benefits. Some philosophers argue that countries cannot sustain these programs unless there is a certain level of social cohesion: people in a country need to feel connected to each other and care about each other. Allowing unlimited immigration could reduce this cohesion, and so countries have a right to exclude immigrants who might break down these bonds.^[3]

A similar argument in defense of the right to exclude immigrants is that countries have duties to their citizens: they must protect and provide for their citizens. Since immigration inevitably involves adding new citizens, which adds additional obligations to the country, it should be up to the country whether it wants to accept these obligations.^[4]

A fourth argument in defense of the right to exclude immigrants is that freedom of association includes the right to refuse to associate. Similar to how you and your friends can decide who to invite to a party, you and your fellow citizens should be able to decide whom to allow to immigrate.^[5]

A similar argument defending exclusion is that countries have been created and sustained by their citizens. The country therefore belongs to its existing citizens, and they should get to decide how to run their country. This includes making decisions about whom to let in.^[6]

2. Arguments Against Exclusion

Other philosophers think countries should not have the right to block immigration except for immediate health and safety reasons, like excluding people with dangerous infectious diseases like ebola or people who aim to carry out terrorist attacks.^[7] This position is often known as “open borders” because most people carry neither dangerous infections nor an intent to carry out terrorism. So, according to this position, most people ought to be allowed to freely move to any country.

Philosophers who defend open borders oppose the various arguments for exclusion. One argument for open borders is that if arguments for exclusion of immigrants are successful, then these reasons would also justify stripping citizenship from existing citizens, and deporting them. But, we think that it is wrong to exclude existing citizens by stripping their citizenship and deporting them. This is true even if existing citizens are, for example, causing the culture to change. So, exclusion must be unjustified, because it’s wrong to do to existing citizens and thus is also wrong to do to immigrants.^[8]

Another argument for open borders is that people have a right to move freely. Imagine being told you cannot move between cities in your own country for some reason other than blocking the spread of infectious diseases or preventing you from carrying out a violent attack. That would unacceptably violate your rights. Some philosophers argue the same is true about moving between countries, and so any argument for exclusion must fail.^[9]

A third argument for open borders is that we should be free to associate with whomever we want. If you want to marry a foreigner and have them come live with you, or hire a foreigner to come work with you, this should be legal. Similar to how it would be wrong for your country to say you can’t marry or hire someone from another city, it should not be able to tell you that you can’t marry or hire someone from another country.^[10]

A fourth argument for open borders is that excluding people requires unjust enforcement mechanisms. These mechanisms harm citizens of the country.^[11] For example, in the United States, Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and Customs and Border Protection (CBP) have spied on journalists and killed United States citizens.^[12] Because mistreatment of citizens is wrong, and because it is hard or impossible to avoid this mistreatment and to still enforce immigration restrictions, some argue that countries must refrain from restricting immigration: even if countries technically have a right to exclude immigrants, they shouldn’t exercise this right.^[13]

Finally, another argument for open borders is that border restrictions make inequality worse.^[14] People born in rich countries have much better life prospects than people born in poor countries. One reason for this is that people in poor countries can’t freely move to rich countries where they could earn more money. Preventing poorer people from moving makes the world less equal. If we care about equality, perhaps we should accept open borders.^[15]

3. Conclusion

Most philosophers fall on one side or another of the immigration debate: they either accept that countries have a right to exclude immigrants for many reasons, or they endorse open borders and deny that countries have a right to exclude immigrants for most reasons. However, some philosophers defend a middle position, which accepts some rights to exclude but rejects many others.^[16]

There are also many related topics that philosophers discuss, such as what exceptions apply to rights to exclude (like the refugee exception noted above), and whether countries should be able to admit immigrants who are given lesser rights than citizens.^[17]

Notes

^[1] The related question of the right to exit is discussed less by philosophers. For some exceptions see Lenard (2015), Stilz (2016), Wellman (2016), and Sharp (2023).

^[2] This argument is made by Miller (2016a) and Joshi (2018) and objected to by Weltman (2020).

^[3] The right to prevent immigration in order to defend social bonds is defended by Walzer (1983) and Miller (2016a) and attacked by Lee (2019).

^[4] Blake (2013) argues that countries have a right to refuse immigrants if they do not want to take on the obligations of looking after those immigrants. Abizadeh (2016) provides an objection.

^[5] The freedom of association argument is defended by Altman and Wellman (2009) and criticized by Fine (2010). A similar argument is made by Song (2017).

^[6] The argument about country ownership is made by Pevnick (2011).

^[7] Broad arguments against a right to exclude can be found in Cole (2000), Abizadeh (2008), and Sager (2020).

^[8] Arguments claiming that exclusion of immigrants would license exclusion of citizens are made by Cole (2000), Lægaard (2013), Hidalgo (2014), Kates and Pevnick (2014), Freiman (2015), Mendoza (2015), Brezger and Cassee (2016), Akhtar (2017), and Weltman (2021). Carnes (2018) objects to some of these arguments.

^[9] This is known as the “cantilever” argument, because it uses the idea of freedom of movement inside the country as a “cantilever” to support freedom of movement between countries (Carens 2013, 237-45). This view is defended by Torresi (2010), Hosen (2013), and Brezger and Cassee (2016) and objected to by Miller (2016b, 23-5) and Song (2018, 93-110).

^[10] This is called the “libertarian” argument for open borders. For discussion see Kukathas (2005) and Huemer (2010). For an introduction to libertarianism, see Robert Nozick’s “Wilt Chamberlain” Argument for Libertarianism by Daniel Weltman.

^[11] For discussion of the ways in which immigration enforcement mechanisms harm people, see Hidalgo (2015), Lindauer (2017), Wang (2024), and Moore (2026).

^[12] Jones et al. (2019) and Hellmann (2026).

^[13] For discussion of arguments against immigration restrictions based on the objectionable features of enforcement mechanisms, see Mendoza (2014; 2015), Massey and Pren (2012), Jaggar (2020), Finlayson (2020), Lister (2020), Reed-Sandoval (2020), Weltman (2020), and Niño Arnaiz (2024).

^[14] To better understand how inequality is often understood, see Equality: What Is It and How Is It Different from Equity? by Daniel Weltman and Distributive Justice: How Should Resources be Allocated? by Dick Timmer and Tim Meijers.

^[15] For discussion of equality and open borders see Carens (2013, 226), Wellman and Cole (2011), Oberman (2013), Ferracioli (2014), Brock (2016), and Blake (2016).

^[16] Defenders of middle positions include Oberman (2016), Song (2018), and Stilz (2019).

^[17] For overviews of arguments about immigration, including discussions of other topics like refugees, see Wilcox (2009), Fine (2013), Fine and Ypi (2016), and Wellman (2024).

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About the Author

Daniel Weltman is an associate professor of philosophy at Ashoka University, India. He works primarily on topics in social and political philosophy and in ethics. DanielWeltman.com

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