Originally Posted on Citizen Orange

I was excited to find out over the weekend that David Neiwart, through his own blog and a cross-post on Firedoglake linked to me and others in the pro-migrant blogosphere in the last post of his three-part series on immigration:

The blogosphere can have a role in this change as well. There is a wealth of blogs out there dealing with immigration and Latino issues on a regular basis, and many of them feature not just important perspectives that need to be part of the conversation, but compelling and powerful writing as well.

A sampling: Migra Matters, Latina Lista, Matt Ortega,Immigration Prof Blog, The Silence of our Friends, Citizen Orange, The Unapologetic Mexican ... well, the list is long, and this one is certainly incomplete. But you get the idea. [ Source :David Neiwart]

I encourage you to use my blogroll on the right to complete that list, but now that he's finished his series I thought I'd use it as an opportunity to insert my own commentary, and hopefully build or hone on what was a massive and ambitious undertaking for Neiwart. Neiwart wrote three posts. One introducing his series, a second debunking a lot of the anti-migrant myths that exist, and a third with proposals about how to move forward.

While the first two posts were informative, I'm going to spend my time on Dave's third post, "Immigration: Looking Forward". This post is the second major migrant manifesto to emerge out of the blogosphere, coming after Duke's post that garnered a front-page spot on Daily Kos. In his post, Neiwart outlines what a "liberal program for comprehensive immigration reform" would contain:

• It would embrace the fundamental dignity of immigrants, as well as the respect due (sic) their contributions to the country, both culturally and economically [...]
• It would be not just about "family values", but about improving and enhancing the well-being of every American family, regardless of status [...]
• It would make immigration law reflect basic American democratic values: fair play, equality of opportunity, and most of all, fundamental human decency: the mutual respect for our individual rights and freedoms and responsibilities as well as the value of community action in bettering life for every citizen [...]
• Insist on asserting the right of immigrants to work without being subjected to the panoply of abuses by corporate and business interests who profit from the status quo -- particularly the right to decent wages and working conditions, as well as the ability to organize both as workers and as political blocs. [...]
• It should recognize that the clearest means to achieve real equality of opportunity for immigrants lies in creating and equitable and obtainable path to citizenship for those who come here to work [...]
• Comprehend the "bigger picture" by directly engaging our (sic) the governments of neighboring nations, especially Mexico and Latin America, in an economic program aimed at eradicating the grotesque differential in wages -- as well as basic standards of living -- between those nations and the United States.

[Source: David Neiwart]

I think Neiwart's and Duke's posts are very good starting points for U.S. progressives to work from. Still, I can't help but feel that there is something missing from these two gargantuan posts. I'm not yet prepared to articulate exactly what that is, but I will describe the seeds from which these thoughts are emerging.

Before I begin I'm probably going to have to preface my statements for all the anti-migrant trolls out there. I love the United States. I'll never forget when I returned to Guatemala after the trip I took
retracing the route of a Guatemalan migrant into the U.S. and a Guatemalan
told my father that only a Gringo would do something like that voluntarily.

The sentiment epitomizes my love for the U.S.: a place where "the people" truly can speak at times, even against overwhelming odds, and shine the light of their truth all around the world.

What's more, in recent years, I've even restored my faith in U.S. democracy, which for those that know me, is a pretty astounding. I still think that at a national level U.S. democracy doesn't work, but it's amazing what one can achieve with only a few hundred votes at the local level. Coincidentally, it is at a local level that we can do the most good for migrants in the U.S.

Saying all this, I'll get onto my story: I'll never forget a feeling that I had in the 2006 marches. In 2006 U.S. migrants looked so strong. It seemed as if nothing could stand in the way of progress towards a more just world. But, during those marches, there was a moment that made my heart sink, a moment that I believe sowed the seeds of what became more years of heightened fear and oppression for migrants.

After the first marches, migrants started catching a lot of flack for flying the flags of their home countries. Leaders of the marches, at the time, thought it would be wise to ask migrants to drop their flags and pick up U.S. flags. I'll never forget the first time I saw a Guatemalan put down a Guatemalan flag and pick up a U.S. one. My heart just filled with this sense of dread. Again, this isn't because I hate the U.S. I couldn't quite explain it at the time, but months later I came across a Malcolm X quote that described part of my feelings about it.

I’m no politician. I’m not even a student of politics. I’m not a Republican, nor a Democrat, nor an American, and got sense enough to know it. I’m one of the 22 million black victims of the Democrats, one of the 22 million black victims of the Republicans, and one of the 22 million black victims of Americanism. And when I speak, I don’t speak as a Democrat, or a Republican, *nor an American.* I speak as a victim of America’s so-called democracy. You and I have never seen democracy; all we’ve seen is hypocrisy.

When we open our eyes today and look around America, we see America not through the eyes of someone who have -- who has enjoyed the fruits of Americanism, we see America through the eyes of someone who has been the victim of Americanism. We don’t see any American dream; we’ve experienced only the American nightmare. We haven’t benefited from America’s democracy; we’ve only suffered from America’s hypocrisy. And the generation that’s coming up now can see it and are not afraid to say it. [ Source : Malcolm X , The Ballot or the Bullet]

While I am grateful that both Duke and Neiwart have made tackling the roots of migration central to their platforms, again I can't help but feel that it goes deeper than that.

You see, both Duke and Neiwart approach migration from a quintessentially "American" perspective. In fact, both use the word "American" several times which is a flawed term when it comes to migrants.

For migrants, and from a global perspective, America represents the entire western hemisphere.  Both also use the U.S. centric term "immigrant". That suggests someone from Guatemala should use the term "emigrant". The global citizen, however, uses the term migrant.

I'm not trying to nitpick, or attack, because I believe these proposals are very good. What I'm trying to hint at is an underlying philosophy that is missing in these proposals. A philosophy that no one has formulated to any real extent.

The fact that our underlying philosophy has yet to be articulated is hurting us. For instance, it is a fundamental contradiction to be against free-trade / globalization at the same time that you are pro-migrant, and if it isn't then we have to articulate a pretty complex position that is anti-trade globalization and pro-labor globalization. After getting slapped around about this a few times by my ivy league Ph.D. candidate political scientist friends, I thought I'd get back to the books, and while I'm not yet at a point where I can firmly articulate the correct philosophy, I was pointed to a recent academic work that I think scratches the tip of the iceberg: "The Rights of Others: Aliens, Residents, and Citizens" by Seyla Benhabib.

In it, Benhabib identifies what I think is the central contradiction with the pro-migrant view. It is expressed in this quote:

Republican equality is distinct from universal moral equality. The right to have rights cannot be guaranteed by a world state or another world organizations, but only by the collective will of circumscribed polities, which in turn, willy-nilly, perpetrate their own regimes of exclusion. The paradox of democratic self-determination leads the democratic sovereign to self-constitution as well as to
exclusion. [Source : Seyla Benhabib, The Rights of Others]

In this paper she identifies the difference between moral rights, and juridico-civil rights. I think every pro-migrant advocate identifies with moral rights. I was able to grasp the concept of moral rights even as a child. Morally, we should all be born equal, and national boundaries result in inequality.

I personally believe that the greatest inequities that exist today are those that exist across national boundaries and from a moral rights stand-point this is wrong. From a moral rights standpoint we could also argue that the U.S. was founded on the very principles that should eliminate this global wrong in this famous statement:

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. [Source : Declaration of Independence]

I always like to joke with anti-migrant trolls about the "inalienable" part. But often, pro-migrant advocates conveniently forget what immediately follows the above statement, which an anti-migrant troll would be wise to pick out.

That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men [Source : Declaration of Independence]

This is the juridico-civil part. We know about the universal moral part, but that is always at odds with the juridico-civil element of this discussion. That is to say, all men are created equal, but a government needs to be created to secure that equality, and the creation of a new government, at least up to this point in time, has always been at odds with the universal moral concept of equality.

Again, just to make myself absolutely clear. Not only did the U.S. create a new "we" as in "we the people" with the declaration of independence, but the U.S. also created a "them" not represented in the document. Others have picked this up domestically in the sense that Native Americans, women, slaves, and other minorities were not included in this "we" but the same is true for people from other countries, non-U.S. citizens.

Why does a philosophical discussion like this matter?

Because even if all of Duke's and Neiwart's proposals are implemented, we're still not getting at the core question which continues to plague the globe : How do we start prioritizing the billions that live on less than $2 a day when they are not represented in the world's most powerful democracies?

A world government is not the answer. Incorporating this reality into the democratic systems that already exist, is. But how do we do that? And with what philosophical principles? Certainly we have the universal moral argument on our sides, but we have yet to define the juridico-civil argument.

That is to say, we have yet to identify a way of practically addressing the needs of migrants, and through them the billions of the majority world, within the context of the privileged world, where all the power and resources lie.

I hope this discussion wasn't to cryptic, or too pie in the sky. I'm going to continue to develop my thoughts, but until then I encourage others to give me their thoughts on this.