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Abstract
On what basis, and to what extent, are refugees obligated to obey the laws of their host countries? Consideration of the specific case of asylum-seekers generates, I think, two competing intuitions: (1) the refugee has a prima facie obligation to obey the laws of her host country and (2) none of the popularly canvassed substrates of political obligation—consent, tacit consent, fairness, or social role—is at all apt to explain the presence of this obligation. I contend that the unfashionable gratitude account of political obligation does the best job of accounting for the intuitions. As has been noticed by other commentators, obligations of gratitude are difficult to specify and subject to numerous cancelling conditions. I analyze these conditions in detail and conclude that if one accepts that gratitude is the basis of the political obligation of the refugee, then one must face up to just how frangible the obligation is. In particular, the obligation is conditional on the fair and generous treatment of refugees that is consistent with their dignity as human beings.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This paper benefitted from a stimulating audience at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as well as comments by David Estlund, Jon Mandle and three referees from this journal.
Notes
1 Convention Relation to the Status of Refugees Article 1:A http://www.unhcr.org/3b66c2aa10.html Accessed 3/5/2014
2 Roger Zetter, “More Labels, Fewer Refugees: Remaking the Refugee Label in the Era of Globalization,” Journal of Refugee Studies Vol. 20, No. 2 (2007).
3 This is merely to avoid complication; I do not intend to make any commentary on who the “real” refugees are, or whether the Convention definition is adequate.
4 Michael O. Hardimon, “Role Obligations,” Journal of Philosophy Vol. 91, No. 7 (1994): 334.
5 Ibid., 338.
6 Ibid., 358.
7 Ibid.
8 Ibid., 360.
9 Ronald Dworkin, Law's Empire (Cambridge: Belknap Press, 1986), 206.
10 But for a particularly cogent critique, see Simmons (1996).
11 Bruce B. Dunning, “Vietnamese in America: The Adaptation of the 1975–1979 Arrivals,” in Refugees as Immigrants: Cambodians, Laotians, and Vietnamese in America, ed. David Haines (Totowa: Rowman & Littlefield, 1989), 55.
12 Ibid., 62.
13 William Finnegan, “New in Town,” New Yorker, December 11, 2006, 48.
14 Ibid., 58.
15 A notable exception is Gilbert (2006), who argues that coercive agreements can sometime be binding. Margaret Gilbert, A Theory of Political Obligation (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008).
16 David Hume, “Of the Original Contract,” in Political Essays/David Hume ed. Knud Haakonssen (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1994), 191.
17 Sec. 119.
18 Social Contract IV.ii.
19 H.L.A. Hart, “Are There Any Natural Rights?” Philosophical Review 64 (1955): 185.
20 Ibid., 190–191.
21 John Rawls, Theory of Justice (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1971), 112.
22 Robert Nozick, Anarchy, State, and Utopia (New York: Basic Books, 1972), 94–95.
23 Ibid., 95.
24 50d–51d.
25 Richard Kraut offers a limited defense of the analogy in Socrates in the State (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1984) pp. 143–148.
26 A. John Simmons, Moral Principles and Political Obligations (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1979), 170–179.
27 An anonymous reviewer points out that the illegal immigrant may enjoy some legal protections simply because the state enforces laws against killing, stealing, etc. But the fact remains that access to legal redress is significantly limited if the illegal immigrant fears deportation.
28 Simmons, Moral Principles and Political Obligations, 178.
29 An anonymous reviewer points out that one can avoid Simmons's condition (5) altogether by following McConnell (1993) in changing condition (4) from “the beneficiary wants the benefit” to the “the beneficiary accepts the benefit”. Terrence McConnell Gratitude (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1993).
30 This point has been made by several others, including Simmons (1979) pp 179–180.
31 Simmons, Moral Principles and Political Obligations, 185.
32 Nannerl O. Henry, “Political Obligation and Collective Goods,” in Nomos XII: Political and Legal Obligation, ed. J. Roland Pennock et al. (New York: Atherton Press, 1970), 186.
33 This is a thorny and complicated issue that cannot be adequately treated within the scope of this essay. However, for an account that I find congenial, see Derek Parfit, Reasons and Persons chapter 3. Derek Parfit, Reasons and Persons (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1984), pp 75–82.
34 This objection was raised by an anonymous referee from this journal.
35 Claudia Card, “Gratitude and Obligation,” American Philosophical Quarterly 25:2 (1988): 124.
36 It should be noted that all other accounts of political obligation bear this same burden.
37 Here I am in agreement with Richard Kraut (1984) and Dudley Knowles “Gratitude and Good Government” Res Publica 8:1(2002) pp 1–20.
38 Card, “Gratitude and Obligation,” 121.
39 Thomas Hobbes, De Cive or The Citizen, ed. S. P. Lamprecht (New York: Appleton-Century Crofts, 1949), 47.