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One issue is that the "new" left just can't get over open borders. It is in fact a major point of friction between traditional socialists and the more modern on

One issue is that the "new" left just can't get over open borders. It is in fact a major point of friction between traditional socialists and the more modern ones. The problem with that is as the article describes: > Young workers must accept that our fate relies on our co-operation. If I accept an unpaid internship, I have undercut my generation. I have not only devalued my labour but that of my peers too. I am complicit in the denigration of my generation. This same issue applies, as can be easily observed in any large city, to immigrants. Having a fair labour market is fundamentally incompatible with free movement of goods (meaning we need to heavily tax your ipad if we are to have more equality) and with the free movement of labour (meaning equality and open borders are fundamentally incompatible ). one might say, but not if we have worldwide socialism. That is right to an extent, but that effectively means that long as there are a few exploitative states we can't have socialism and fair labour markets anywhere else. Needless to say, there is lots of propaganda about how it's "racist" to be opposed to large scale people movement, even though the economic reason for it is obvious in any large city : to enable the economic exploitation of the weak by the powerful. I'm just hoping that at some point we can accept that "I want closed borders to improve labour conditions" will be recognized as obviously the non-racist opinion (and open borders, since it's real effect is exploitation of "the other", recognized as the racist option)

dragonwriter 9y ago
> One issue is that the "new" left just can't get over open borders. It is in fact a major point of friction between traditional socialists and the more modern ones (1) Internationalism over nationalism is old socialism; if anything. (2) I've seen very few leftists (new or traditional) who supported “open borders” as a short-term policy in any modern advanced country; I've seen many who support reforms of immigration rules (e.g., in the US, aligning slotd within existig overall quotas better with demand by removing or altering per country limits as a means of reducing the incentive for illegal immigration)—or simply opposed adding additional restrictions—with those positions attacked by the nativist right as “open borders”, but very little actual support for anything like actual open borders.
- candiodari 9y ago
  I feel like you're misrepresenting things on both counts. About (1) I would say that internationalism in the old socialism is not AT ALL about open borders. Rather it is about causing socialist revolutions within every country. The movement should cross borders, not people and certainly not goods. In fact, I believe they are against international trade except where absolutely necessary. About (2) I can only say that I have. It has come to the point that you cannot say in leftist company even basic things like "illegal immigrants should not be allowed to remain". Talking about "immigration must be limited strictly to below the point where it destroys the labour market" is likely to get you banned. Is your experience different ?
  - dragonwriter 9y ago
    > Talking about "immigration must be limited strictly to below the point where it destroys the labour market" is likely to get you banned. Is your experience different ? My experience is that leftists generally have no ideological problem with efforts to restrict the overall level of immigration (I've seen several arguments that the current system of hard quotas and tossing money at enforcement aren't a cost-effective means of doing that, but that's a different issue), and, speaking of the US, in particular often favor more sharply limiting (or even abolishing) employment-based immigration (including non-immigrant programs like the H-1B.) They tend to prefer loosening existing numerical restrictions on family reunification immigration. I've not seen any significant support for genuinely open borders, and I myself am the only even left-leaning (I won't call myself a leftist) person I've encountered who proposed any (though limited—based on fees rather than quotas) legal immigration outside of existing preference categories. The kind of oversimplifying statements you suggest which treat immigration as a whole and the sole concern in immigration policy being the market effects on wage labor are something that I can see being unwelcome on the left, whether old or new, but not because either favors open borders.

dragonwriter 9y ago

> One issue is that the "new" left just can't get over open borders. It is in fact a major point of friction between traditional socialists and the more modern ones (1) Internationalism over nationalism is old socialism; if anything. (2) I've seen very few leftists (new or traditional) who supported “open borders” as a short-term policy in any modern advanced country; I've seen many who support reforms of immigration rules (e.g., in the US, aligning slotd within existig overall quotas better with demand by removing or altering per country limits as a means of reducing the incentive for illegal immigration)—or simply opposed adding additional restrictions—with those positions attacked by the nativist right as “open borders”, but very little actual support for anything like actual open borders.

candiodari 9y ago
I feel like you're misrepresenting things on both counts. About (1) I would say that internationalism in the old socialism is not AT ALL about open borders. Rather it is about causing socialist revolutions within every country. The movement should cross borders, not people and certainly not goods. In fact, I believe they are against international trade except where absolutely necessary. About (2) I can only say that I have. It has come to the point that you cannot say in leftist company even basic things like "illegal immigrants should not be allowed to remain". Talking about "immigration must be limited strictly to below the point where it destroys the labour market" is likely to get you banned. Is your experience different ?
- dragonwriter 9y ago
  > Talking about "immigration must be limited strictly to below the point where it destroys the labour market" is likely to get you banned. Is your experience different ? My experience is that leftists generally have no ideological problem with efforts to restrict the overall level of immigration (I've seen several arguments that the current system of hard quotas and tossing money at enforcement aren't a cost-effective means of doing that, but that's a different issue), and, speaking of the US, in particular often favor more sharply limiting (or even abolishing) employment-based immigration (including non-immigrant programs like the H-1B.) They tend to prefer loosening existing numerical restrictions on family reunification immigration. I've not seen any significant support for genuinely open borders, and I myself am the only even left-leaning (I won't call myself a leftist) person I've encountered who proposed any (though limited—based on fees rather than quotas) legal immigration outside of existing preference categories. The kind of oversimplifying statements you suggest which treat immigration as a whole and the sole concern in immigration policy being the market effects on wage labor are something that I can see being unwelcome on the left, whether old or new, but not because either favors open borders.