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ABSTRACT: A liberal politics is, in moral principle at least, a universalist politics: a politics that assumes that there is no "other"; there is only "us," all entitled to equal treatment. This ideal inspired the 1951 Refugee Convention, which now faces a crisis of consent in Western societies because of the sheer numbers of people claiming refugee protection. Public opinion is also turning against the universalist premise. Citizens ask why they should extend citizenship rights to strangers and why their state shouldn't be able to exclude whom it wants from its borders. How to respond to this crisis of consent? By defending the universalist right of persons in distress to seek asylum, but also by appealing to citizens to reconceive their relationship to strangers as a gift: they give welcome to strangers as a gift that confers obligations on the beneficiary, namely the obligation to live by the rules of the society that made the gift of asylum.
Michael Ignatieff (Fri,) studied this question.
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