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Not the parent you replied to, but the modern passport as we know it goes back only about 100 years. > Migration was generally speaking, unhindered and each em

Not the parent you replied to, but the modern passport as we know it goes back only about 100 years. > Migration was generally speaking, unhindered and each emigrant could decide on the time of his departure, his arrival or his return, to suit his own convenience. But World War I brought harsh restrictions on freedom of movement. [0] > The concept of a worldwide passport standard is relatively new, created in the aftermath of the First World War. ...the United States at the turn of the last century emerges: a near constant rush of immigrants, most destined to pass through Ellis Island. There they were given a cursory disease check, questioned, and in most cases, allowed to proceed on their journeys inward. This was easy enough to do without a global standard for identifying documents. [1] > On the outbreak of the First World War, countries imposed border controls to block the entry of subversives and the exit of men with skills useful to the war effort. Passports were issued to allow travellers access through these restrictions. When peace came in 1918 most countries retained both border controls and passports. [2] There used to be more restrictions on commerce than on people. Now it is the opposite. Money can move freely across international borders, and labor has become something to arbitrage. [0] https://fee.org/articles/passports-were-a-temporary-war-measure/ https://fee.org/articles/passports-were-a-temporary-war-meas... [1] https://www.nationalgeographic.com/travel/article/a-history-of-the-passport https://www.nationalgeographic.com/travel/article/a-history-... [2] https://www.historyextra.com/period/medieval/when-passports-first-introduced/ https://www.historyextra.com/period/medieval/when-passports-...

colonCapitalDee 4y ago
I'm not convinced. Passports might be a modern invention (and really that isn't surprising, a global identification system requires sophisticated bureaucracy and cheap, accessible transportation), but that doesn't mean that people used to be able to move freely across borders. Modern technology makes immigration accessible to the masses in a way that simply wasn't the case in the pre-modern world. A few things you would have to consider before immigrating in the pre-modern world: - Where are you going? There's no internet, books are rare, and maps are inaccurate (and often plain wrong) - How will you get there? Transportation is expensive and unreliable - How will you preserve wealth? A global financial system accessible to normal folks does not exist yet - What will you do to support yourself? Pre-modern communication infrastructure makes scoping out foreign labor markets difficult - How will you learn the language? You'll have to find someone to teach it to you, instructional material will be limited - Who will you leave behind? Any family members that don't come with you will likely never be seen or heard from again - What if people decide you're not welcome? Well-enforced protections against discrimination do not exist yet People did immigrate, so obviously immigration was not impossible. Not all of these questions apply to every situation (people migrating to an adjacent country would not have to deal with many of these concerns). But immigration was far harder than it is today, and fraught with risk. Pre-modern borders were, by virtue of being pre-modern, effectively closed.
- mikem170 4y ago
  I agree that modern transport and communication has significantly changed peoples abilities to migrate. Wouldn't this mean that eventually the world will be more integrated in every dimension, regardless of the desires of those controlling borders, that lower barriers to communication and transportation will continue to make the world a smaller place? Will it be possible to stop this as the decades and centuries go by? There's already millions of people crossing borders every year, like the southern U.S. border, refugees from Africa and the Middle East into Europe, migrants leaving Russia and Ukraine, migrants between countries in Africa, Asia, and South America, etc. One might expect those numbers to increase over time, as it gets easier to travel. Perhaps it is inevitable that the world will continue to integrate.
WaitWaitWha 4y ago
The original post I was asking for further details is about borders, not passport. That said, passports have been around near as long as borders, just did not have the smart chip embedded in them. Letters of recommendations or safe passage to pass a port have been around nearly as long as the notion of sovereign boundaries. It might have been a parchment with a wax seal, a ring, or a stick with a burn-mark, maybe even clay tablet, but the purpose of the "passport" is the same - passage into and across a territory controlled by another group other than the person holding the "passport" - i.e. safe passage. Your reference last states King Henry the 5th of England had "pass porte" in the early 15th century. The Greek city states had safe-passage documents between each other way before the English. There is a bilingual "letters of recommendation" in Chinese and Tibetan from the 10th century to allow safe passage for a pilgrimage. A thing that allows a non-local to pass safely into and out of a territory. (British Library IOL Tib J 754) https://www.princeton.edu/news/2014/11/17/bringing-ancient-buddhism-light https://www.princeton.edu/news/2014/11/17/bringing-ancient-b...
- mikem170 4y ago
  I saw that there were passport documents for safety in the past, like you mentioned. I've also heard of documents called passports being used to grant foreigners permission to conduct commerce, and others allowing locals to move between provinces within a country. I wonder about borders, too. I wonder when they started guarding borders like they do today. I know there were places with minimal border control, like the U.S. before the world wars. Were there places a hundred years ago and earlier where boarders were guarded like they are today? Did they want to keep the serfs in place? Did rulers care about peasants moving back and forth? Weren't boarders usually less populated areas, with nobody keeping track of crossings? Or are modern borders, imperfect as they are, only possible at this time due to modern governments and the military resources they can dedicate to such things? My guess is that modern borders and modern passports came about around the same time. There's no sense in requiring documentation for every person crossing a border unless a country has the wherewithal to enforce that rule.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]

colonCapitalDee 4y ago

I'm not convinced. Passports might be a modern invention (and really that isn't surprising, a global identification system requires sophisticated bureaucracy and cheap, accessible transportation), but that doesn't mean that people used to be able to move freely across borders. Modern technology makes immigration accessible to the masses in a way that simply wasn't the case in the pre-modern world. A few things you would have to consider before immigrating in the pre-modern world: - Where are you going? There's no internet, books are rare, and maps are inaccurate (and often plain wrong) - How will you get there? Transportation is expensive and unreliable - How will you preserve wealth? A global financial system accessible to normal folks does not exist yet - What will you do to support yourself? Pre-modern communication infrastructure makes scoping out foreign labor markets difficult - How will you learn the language? You'll have to find someone to teach it to you, instructional material will be limited - Who will you leave behind? Any family members that don't come with you will likely never be seen or heard from again - What if people decide you're not welcome? Well-enforced protections against discrimination do not exist yet People did immigrate, so obviously immigration was not impossible. Not all of these questions apply to every situation (people migrating to an adjacent country would not have to deal with many of these concerns). But immigration was far harder than it is today, and fraught with risk. Pre-modern borders were, by virtue of being pre-modern, effectively closed.

mikem170 4y ago
I agree that modern transport and communication has significantly changed peoples abilities to migrate. Wouldn't this mean that eventually the world will be more integrated in every dimension, regardless of the desires of those controlling borders, that lower barriers to communication and transportation will continue to make the world a smaller place? Will it be possible to stop this as the decades and centuries go by? There's already millions of people crossing borders every year, like the southern U.S. border, refugees from Africa and the Middle East into Europe, migrants leaving Russia and Ukraine, migrants between countries in Africa, Asia, and South America, etc. One might expect those numbers to increase over time, as it gets easier to travel. Perhaps it is inevitable that the world will continue to integrate.

WaitWaitWha 4y ago

The original post I was asking for further details is about borders, not passport. That said, passports have been around near as long as borders, just did not have the smart chip embedded in them. Letters of recommendations or safe passage to pass a port have been around nearly as long as the notion of sovereign boundaries. It might have been a parchment with a wax seal, a ring, or a stick with a burn-mark, maybe even clay tablet, but the purpose of the "passport" is the same - passage into and across a territory controlled by another group other than the person holding the "passport" - i.e. safe passage. Your reference last states King Henry the 5th of England had "pass porte" in the early 15th century. The Greek city states had safe-passage documents between each other way before the English. There is a bilingual "letters of recommendation" in Chinese and Tibetan from the 10th century to allow safe passage for a pilgrimage. A thing that allows a non-local to pass safely into and out of a territory. (British Library IOL Tib J 754) https://www.princeton.edu/news/2014/11/17/bringing-ancient-buddhism-light https://www.princeton.edu/news/2014/11/17/bringing-ancient-b...

mikem170 4y ago
I saw that there were passport documents for safety in the past, like you mentioned. I've also heard of documents called passports being used to grant foreigners permission to conduct commerce, and others allowing locals to move between provinces within a country. I wonder about borders, too. I wonder when they started guarding borders like they do today. I know there were places with minimal border control, like the U.S. before the world wars. Were there places a hundred years ago and earlier where boarders were guarded like they are today? Did they want to keep the serfs in place? Did rulers care about peasants moving back and forth? Weren't boarders usually less populated areas, with nobody keeping track of crossings? Or are modern borders, imperfect as they are, only possible at this time due to modern governments and the military resources they can dedicate to such things? My guess is that modern borders and modern passports came about around the same time. There's no sense in requiring documentation for every person crossing a border unless a country has the wherewithal to enforce that rule.
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]