Liberal democracies benefit greatly from immigration, both economically and culturally. But they also unquestionably have the right to control their own borders. A democratic political system is based on a contract between government and citizen in which both have obligations. Such a contract makes no sense without delimitation of citizenship and exercise of the franchise. All people have a basic human right to citizenship, something that, according to the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, cannot be arbitrarily taken away from them. But that does not mean they have the right to
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