The Case for Open Borders

by John Washington

The wall that day when Abu Yassin couldn’t find warmth for his daughter, the wall that Turkey was defending with support of the European Union and the United States, was not impermeable. Others could pass. Turks could cross the wall in either direction. Foreign dignitaries, American citizens, Germans, reporters, anyone with enough luck to be gifted the proper passport could pass, flash their papers and cross, and cross again—they could do a triumphantly slow two-step back and forth to the rhythm of their national anthem: Syria to Turkey, Turkey to Syria, back and again. But anybody born in Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, or any African country would be blanketly barred, left to burn their front doors for warmth. That discrepancy defines much of our contemporary world. Not only are some free to traipse the globe while others are immobilized by walls and visa controls, but the very difference is the fulcrum point that drives the worldwide inequality regime—not only financial inequality but an inequality of rights, prospects, security, opportunity; an inequality of life.