The British government recently changed its immigration policy. Well, I say it changed it, but perhaps what it did or, worse, “signalled”, was to intensify its existing policy. Immigration to the UK from outside the EU is, henceforth, to be driven by the needs of the labour market. People will only be allowed in if they compensate for some skills shortage. Indeed, the committee which advises the British goverment on immigration policy is now composed exclusively of economists whose role is to tell politicians and bureaucrats when “UK plc” needs computer programmers or nurses. Of course these won’t be the only immigrants, since the UK remains a signatory of the UN Convention on Refugees, and the British government will not be able to evade its obligations in all cases of people fleeing persecution. And there will be some illegals who get through and, for one reason or another, will be able to avoid deportation.
British policy is therefore, like the policy of many other countries, based on the idea that sovereign states have the right to exclude whoever they like and that they can therefore limit inward migration to people who can benefit “us”. There’s no thought given to the rights human beings have to freedom of movement, to the benefits of allowing people to escape poverty and build new lives. No, this is our place, and we’ll let in those whom we choose to. The poor, the huddled masses, can get stuffed.
I’ve been thinking about these issues from within political philosophy for a while now. I’m not an “open borders” advocate in a completely unqualified sense, but, compared to current policy, I am as near as makes no difference. Compare me then to some other, hypothetical academic, who argues in favour of the current policy, or that Britain is “too crowded”, or that the right of freedom of association that citizens have implies the right to exclude would-be immigrant foreigners. Now there may be some intellectually respectable arguments that can be put on such lines (though I doubt it). It isn’t hard to see whose research is more likely to be picked up by politicians and cited as a rationale for what they want to do. Which brings me to the issue of “impact” and to another decision of the British government. Henceforth, research in the UK will be funded not just for its intrinsic quality but also for the benefits it is expected to bring to the wider society. Ministers and higher-education funding bureaucrats have been keen to point out that they don’t simply mean economic benefits and commercial spinoffs. No, they also want to reward research which makes a difference to public policy. Of course, I’d love it to be the case that senior politicians and civil servants read work in political philosophy and theory and, convinced by good arguments, adjust their ideas accordingly. But the cynic in me says that this isn’t what happens. Rather, the attitude that politicians have to research is to latch onto it when it supports the view they already hold and to ignore (or punish) it when it tells them something uncomfortable. Research that supports tighter border controls (or harsher drug laws) will have “impact” and research that favours more immigration or legalizing weed won’t. And the money will follow.
