I blogged the other day about the new restrictions the UK is planning to impose on would-be migrants, making it mpossible for all but the super-rich to acquire permanent residency and forcing others into Gastarbeiter status (to be kicked out after five years). It gets worse. The government’s Migration Advisory Committee has now recommended that anyone seeking to sponsor a foreign (non-EU) spouse to enter the UK has to be in the top half of the income distribution (I simplify slightly). Read Matt Cavanagh on the topic here and the Free Movement blog here. So think through the implications. A British student goes to grad school in the US (for example), meets an American and marries: such a person would, under these proposals, be unable to return to the UK with their partner to live as a couple. If two countries were to adopt such rules and their nationals met and married, they would have the right to live as a couple in neither country. Iniquitous and unjust.

Today brings a well-argued critique of the British government’s latest moves on immigration policy by the Matt Cavanagh of the Institute for Public Policy Research (see also video; New Statesman column) . The UK now proposes (subject to a consultation) to make almost all immigration into the UK by non-EU workers temporary, with an upper limit of five years. There are a few exceptions for footballers, Russian oligarchs and others able and willing to deposit millions of pounds in a UK bank account, but even highly-skilled professionals will be kicked out when their time is up. Though hardly the most vulnerable group globally, I imagine this directly affects a substantial number of regular Crooked Timber readers: postgraduates and early-career academics from places like the US and Australia who apply in droves when we advertise permanent academic positions. In the Cameron-Clegg future, there will be no more Jerry Cohens, Ronald Dworkins, Amartya Sens or Susan Hurleys.

What’s driving this is the coalition’s aim of cutting net migration from about 200,000/year to “tens of thousands”. Since they can’t control inward migration by EU nationals, especially from Eastern Europe, and since outward emigration by the British is falling (though that could change) the squeeze is on. Just about the only variable they can do something about is non-EU, they’ve already made things nearly impossible for low and unskilled workers, so now the upper end are facing these restrictions. As Cavanagh argues, despite the coalition’s rhetoric about people with valuable skills, it is doubtful that such people will choose to take jobs in a country which fails to offer them a viable route to settlement and eventual citizenship. Fortunately, as Cavanagh points out, it is unlikely, on the basis of the experience of similar schemes in other countries (such as the German Gastarbeiter programme) than this policy will achieve its stated aims if implemented. It will however lead to a good deal of human misery as well as depriving the UK economy of many people with scarce skills. Ineffective and perverse then: i.e. bad public policy.

A final, more critical, point on Cavanagh’s otherwise excellent report. A policy-oriented think-tank like IPPR is under different constraints from political philosophers like me. I understand that, and what is politically realistic many not chime with what ideal justice requires. But I’d have liked to have seen a little more in the report about what a just global migration regime would look like. As it is, Cavanagh acknowledges the legitimacy of democratic anti-immigration sentiments and objectives and stresses – to counteract them – the economic benefits of admitting highly skilled workers. On the other side, he pushes back against “progressives” who “reflexively” oppose the tightening of controls. But even aside from whether such voices are correct, it seems to me that the moral defence of the rights and interests of would-be migrants can help frame the debate too (and give the Lib Dems, at least, pause) and that it may be a mistake tacitly to concede that the boundaries of acceptable policy discourse are to be set by economic growth and populist anxiety.

Israel is an atypical state in that it does not have agreed international borders with all of its neighbors. That is especially true in the case of Lebanon and Syria. Israel and Lebanon are currently separated by the so-called Line of Withdrawal of Israeli Forces from Lebanon, agreed in 2000 between Israel and the United Nations and also known as the Blue Line. It corresponds in part with the international border demarcated by the English and French governments in 1923. In practice, there is currently no border between Israel and Lebanon. The situation on the border with Syria is more complex. …. (read the whole thing)

… this corner of south-eastern Texas had its barrier constructed on a levee that follows a straight line from half a mile to two miles north of the river, leaving Ms Taylor’s bungalow – along with the homes and land of dozens of her angry neighbours – marooned on the Mexican side. “My son-in-law likes to say that we live in a gated community,” she says, explaining that to even visit the shops she must pass through a gate watched over by border-patrol officers. “We’re in a sort of no man’s land. I try to laugh, but it’s hard: that fence hasn’t just spoiled our view, it’s spoiled our lives.”

(via @PhillCole on twitter, x-posted at Crooked Timber )

While places like Kurdistan and Somaliland might occupy more of the government’s time, the ranks of aspiring nations are filled with DIY democracies—places like North Dumpling Island in Long Island Sound, and Molossia in (or surrounded by) northern Nevada—that are often equipped with little more than a flag, an anthem, and a back porch. It’s these communities, known as micronations, that Canadian filmmaker Jody Shapiro set out to profile in his latest documentary, How to Start Your Own Country. Mother Jones spoke with Shapiro recently about micro-national alliances, the future of the nation-state, and what happens when the mother country doesn’t get the joke.

Justice and property: on the institutional thesis concerning property.

Here‘s a very concise account of the secession vote and upcoming process.

This Der Spiegel (English) article describes Somalia as the ‘perfect’ failed state.  The BBC News also has an informative profile of Somalia along with a list of articles.

Somaliland – by contrast – is a functioning independent democratic republic within the northern part of the geographic domain of Somalia.  They have not yet received international recognition.  Here is a quick profile of the region.