The paper evolved as a side project to my doctoral dissertation on the theoretical and practical factors factors that ought to determine a just immigration policy. I was reading an article in the New York Times on immigration in Europe and was struck by some remarks made Nyamko Sabuni, Swedish minister for integration and gender equality:
A lot of people misread their rights,” [Sabuni] said recently. “They think that freedom of religion means they can do anything in the name of religion, or that human rights mean that they can act however they want against others.” Not true, she said. “If they want to live here, have kids, have grandchildren, they must make an effort to adapt to the society where they live.”
On one hand, her remarks appear almost banal — of course immigrants have adapt, at least in the sense of obeying the law, respecting entrenched norms and values and contributing to various public goods. (It is also the case that larger societies have to adapt to immigrant groups.) On the other hand, it struck me that she might be requiring something quite radical, namely that immigrants abandon substantial parts of their culture. The word “adapt” is ambiguous and says little about what immigrants’ precise moral obligations are.
While it seemed to me that many people agree that immigrants have some obligations to adapt, I found it extremely difficult to identify the grounds for this belief. What is troublesome is that longstanding groups within societies such as aboriginal groups, national minorities and even people who have chosen an “alternative” lifestyle do not have these obligations. Why should recent immigrants be in a different position, particularly if one values liberal autonomy and rights such as freedom of conscience, freedom of religion and freedom of association?
Working out these issues (or attempting to work them out!) led me to write this paper.
My paper can be downloaded here.
Matt Lister’s comments on the paper are available here.
You can listen to the podcast by clicking the arrow below:
Recent Comments