Wednesday, February 19, 2020

Illegal immigration and Middle East profiling Essay

Illegal immigration and Middle East profiling - Essay Example Turning to positions various political philosophers would have taken on these two global phenomena, we need to closely scrutinize their thoughts on citizenship, liberties, freedom, and human rights. Focusing on Aristotle, his idea of citizenship is equated with virtue. That there is more to citizenship than living in a particular place or sharing in economic activity or ruling under the same laws. He contends that it is a great privilege to be a citizen and had a set of duties. He has certain freedoms that non-citizens do not have and obligations like political participation and military service. In his definition and subsequent argument, he refers to illegal migrants as the vulgar, that is, those who are incapable of citizenship, which leads to virtue. More importantly, those migrants are actually migrating in search of work or rather to become laborers. According to Aristotelian thinking, it is impossible to pursue virtue when one is a laborer. Laborers exist like slaves for the be nefit of male free citizens now that citizens are similar in stock and free. (Cohen and Fermon 114). This would be taken to mean that he does not advocate for non- citizens mixing with citizens, and in any case, therefore, the migrants who are laborers will always remain inferior to citizens and would not enjoy equal rights and liberties. In his argument of a good citizen, he contends whether the virtue of the good man and the excellent citizen is to be regarded as the same or as not the same. That a good man is the one who lives in accordance with virtue and finds happiness in doing so. The Middle East profiling is as a result of evil deeds that have informed such scrutiny. His position would then be that a virtuous person should be protected from the evil one and thus my posit is that, he would support such profiling, but as is typical in his ideas, in moderation. Saint Augustine of the city of god fame is on the worldview that we have a sinful nature and only by the grace of God that we can be saved. His philosophy is closely intertwined with the bible and God as the focal point. That we must obey governments to restrain us from being sinful (Cohen and Fermon 141).He believes in giving everyman his due. From this discussion therefore, illegal migration is sinful and like all other sins, evil. In the case of Middle East profiling, it is also sinful because God would not allow it, as we should all remain co-equals and colleagues. Rawls philosophy is anchored on reasonable pluralism. That is, he is more accommodating to divergence. He contends that, stability of society is organized around justice and he believes in respect for human rights. He postulates that, societies and countries lacking the conditions necessary for a decent or just regime should be assisted to realize it. By assistance, he does not recommend intervention, rather, to necessitate that country to achieve a just regime. These principles, he posits, should govern one nation in relation with t he other. His position in regards to illegal migration would then be that they should be accommodated, and their countries be assisted to achieve conditions that would enable citizens to be comfortable in a just regime which would restore peace and get into the path of economic progress. The same can be said on

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