Altruism and Refugees

Sydasis

Assume an imaginary and overly simplified scenario, one where there is a mass refugee crisis in the world, and you represent a state that is capable of offering refuge to the refugees.

There are 100,000 refugees at your boarder, with your own state having a population of 1,000,000.

Statistics indicate that 1 in 100 of those refugees will cause harm if let in: rape, murder, terror, etc.

Those odds can be reduced to 1 in 1000 by means of an individual vetting processing, but the resources to do so would limit the number of refugees that can be accepted to just 10,000.

The existing native population of your state already has a statistical rate of causing harm that is also 1 in 1000, matching that of a vetted refugee's rate.

The refugees and the state(s) to which these refugees come from share no mutual comradery or trade with you: you are neither friend nor foe.

Other conditions of this refugee crisis can be assumed to be typical of historical ones, including public opinion, costs, and length of the crisis..

What would be the best course of action to handle this crisis as the representative of your state?

I'm always a bit perplexed by emotions and altruistic thoughts when considering situations like this.

Allowing in all the refugees could perhaps double the violence the native population is already dealing with. Allowing in only vetted refugees would keep violence rates roughly the same, but it would still carry a heavy costs. Allowing in no refugees however would introduce no added costs and guarantee no added violence, but it seems as though most societies today see this as the least ethical choice.

Other than perhaps public outcry and international condemnation from not allowing in any refugees, the main benefit that comes to mind for allowing in refugees would be to set an example for the future and other nations, for the purpose of ensuring mutual assurance if ever in the same scenario. Allowing in all the refugees however might end up back firing if the observable outcome of that choice is highly damaging.

I struggle to see why it might otherwise be ethically good to allow in all or any refugees considering the outcome will be overall mostly negative for those you represent. A reason one would care about the outcome of the refugees may be as a result of the similar genome that all humans carry, but in such a large world it seems likely that those refugees would be more a competitor than family.

Am I evil?

Lastly, hi there, this is my first post so I hope I'm not breaking any rules already. It's been a few years since I've had a good forum discussion and have grown tired of Youtube debates.

I can easily see that this topic could be considered political, however I was hoping to keep it detached from current events.

regards.

Streetlight

One thing that seems to be missing from the OPs scenario are differential factors. When you say that, in the hypothetical scenario, 1/100 will cause harm (or 1/1000 after vetting), this treats the refugee population as having, as it were, 'in built' or 'static' characteristics. But violence is more often than not a function of things like social alienation, lack of access to resources (jobs, language, money, housing, etc), which may cause immigrants to turn to local gang communities, say, or black market trade as a result of social/community exclusion.

In other words, capacity for violence needs to be treated not as a 'static' quantity but a dynamic one - a state that invests more resources in intergration - language acquisition, targeted upskilling, cultural awareness programs, housing initiatives, deradicalization programs, access to education and transport, etc - will more likely see less violence among it's immigrants than those states that do not make those investments. The same incoming refugee population will 'respond' differently depending on the manner in which settlement takes place: there are differentials on the ground which will vary the 'harm' involved.

Of course a question involved is whether a state can handle such investments. A well moneyed state might be able to do so - a poorer one may not. And a population influx can bring about advantages too: a broader tax base for a government, more circulating money in an economy, skills and jobs, differing perspectives etc. And of course these are just some parameters that need to be balanced out with others, which can be as much of an economic matter as it can be an ethical or political one.

WISDOMfromPO-MO

Sydasis — Sydasis

Your argument sounds like utilitarianism.

I could be wrong, but I believe that utilitarianism basically says that whatever maximizes aggregate pleasure and minimizes aggregate suffering must be done. Altruism--acting in the interests of others--is just another thing to calculate (the good feelings resulting from acting in the interests of others minus the risks that such action brings, such as the risk of the people you let in causing harm) in a utilitarian scheme, I would say.

If you reject utilitarianism then you have a lot of work left to figure out the right thing to do. Are you as a state/nation partially responsible for their refugee status? If yes, you probably have a moral obligation to offer relief in some way.

That barely scratches the surface of the things you have to consider.

If you are an ethical altruist then you can skip all of that and go straight to the question "What is in the best interests of others?". But who is "others"? Just the refugees? The refugees and everybody already in your state/nation? Everybody on Earth? How are you demarcating "others"? How do you justify your demarcation?

Sydasis

↪StreetlightX

In regards to your 'in built' or 'static' characteristics comment, I'd probably say the statistics of 1 in N I presented would incorporate those dynamic aspects. Lets assume this could be achieved by means of predictive models or observations of final outcomes.

Regarding financial influence, let's assume then that the resource availability is finite and the crime statistics presented considers maximum allowable investment for the two pollution sizes. Larger populations might not have as much investment per individual, resulting perhaps partially in the increased violence rates.

I've generally tried to narrow the conditions and variables to focus on the altruistic and ethical branch of making such a decision. If ethics is not a primary factor in making such a decision, that's interesting, although I'd still be curious to take the discussion to an artificial situation where it was.

And a population influx can bring about advantages too: a broader tax base for a government, more circulating money in an economy, skills and jobs, differing perspectives etc. And of course these are just some parameters that need to be balanced out with others, which can be as much of an economic matter as it can be an ethical or political one.

Seems like a valid argument. I suppose this triggers a deeper aspect of my confusion here, as there are often scenarios where there are no combined economic advantage from allowing in refugees, yet altruism stands strong still in open debates. If there was a benefit of allowing in mass populations, I'd imagine the nation would have open borders already, or at least be at its maximum beneficial level of immigrant influx.

It may be possible to further filter the refugees to include those only capable of providing an economic benefit: skill, job, wealth. I'd imagine that this would only dwindle the number of refugees allowed in to a much smaller number though, perhaps to levels of existing immigration levels. Diversity of immigrants under such a scenario may also be impacted, where non-refugee immigrants end up being rejected as a result.

Sydasis

↪WISDOMfromPO-MO

Utilitarianism comes tied in my head with wealth distribution, but perhaps you're right. I see myself looking at this from a US vs THEM perspective, where my role and responsibility would be towards only the nation I represent, and not to anyone else.

In business, while it might be cheaper for me and my business partner to share a lawyer to come to a legal agreement on our partnership details, we both will instead get our own lawyers that will best represent the interest of the individual and not the group. On a world stage, what might be best for the world isn't necessary what is best for the nation I represent. I

In the case of a refugee crisis, I could perhaps see the world as a whole feeling some responsibly for the refugee crisis, but that assumes the world as a whole cared for its components; if it did, it would ensure the refugees were protected. To achieve this, it would perhaps require international unity and shared sense of responsibility. The world has fairly week unity and leadership though; it instead remains largely a set of competitive nation states. The need for borders or wars may not even exist in a world that was indeed unified.

If humans are able to reach other star systems as colonists, I'd believe the thought of such a unified human race would seem implausible. It may be due to that that we are all still trapped sharing the same small globe that we feel unity is desirable or even possible. The world may need to get quite a bit smaller before that realistically can happen though, and until then, US vs THEM seems to prevail in my head. Even states battle between themselves still, despite sharing a common flag.

As a nation state, perhaps allowing other nation states to sponsor refugees to afford the cost of entry into my nation would work. The 'moral' responsibility would then be shared amongst all world actors. The concern for me then would be to correctly cost out the long term and short term burden of it all. Would it be immoral to try to turn a profit if possible?

Altruism and Refugees

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