Memories of the 28th Century

And trying to make them less unhappy.

Recently I chanced to sit near some people who were discussing trying to create a deportation sanctuary. I’m not much of an eavesdropper, so I didn’t hear all of what they said, but it got me thinking about the matter. I came to the realization that they were looking at the wrong issue. The greater problem is that people are so unhappy in their homelands that they will violate the laws of another country go move there. That tells us that the homeland has problems, and it may be trying to export some problems to happier countries to level the playing field, or the people are just looking for greener pastures. But the basic problem is not with the people who are leaving (if they are leaving, then they probably are bright and hard working); the problem is with their homeland, and that is where any attempt to stop illegal immigration should happen.

In the long run the homeland countries will have to deal with their problems, but it may require some prodding by countries to which people are going for the homelands to do something. And dealing with those problems may cause changes that the leaders do not want, but this is not definite, and the situation varies from country to country.

One measure that is closely related with national happiness is homogeneity of population, and that is why smaller, Nordic countries score so high on happiness (see article link below). The migration from Syria and Afghanistan to Europe in the last few years is the sort of thing that decreases national happiness, but it hasn't done great damage, yet, but eventually the cultural homogeneity will diminish especially in smaller countries. We should note that Syria has been a catchall for small nations and remnant populations (see link below). Afghanistan also has several ethnic groups (see link below).

Some parts of the U.S.A. have deteriorated due, at least in part, to immigration in the last few decades, but in most of the country there have been few immigrants. The attitudes of the indigenes are usually a reflection of their experiences and expectations, and most people favor a stable environment and homogeneous culture.

While the idea of saving people from deportation might sound like a nice thing to do, sending people back to their homelands might be best for them and for their native countries, because they will tend to put pressure on their homeland government to change, and change may be for the better.

Without knowing the exact ethnic and religious composition of the migrants it is impossible to tell for sure, but I think that Syria and Afghanistan would be in much better shape getting the migrants back, if only because they are people with the ambition and drive to try to improve their lives. It is especially sad that Afghanistan has been suffering from war for so long, but the people who have tried so hard to improve their situations might, if they return tip the balance far enough one way that there will be a definite winner there, instead of ongoing civil war.

After World War II, the U.S. had the Marshall Plan to repair the economies of countries in Europe that were damaged by the war’ it was quite successful, and those economies recovered in less than a decade. Maybe we should do something similar for the countries of Latin America that can’t support their people. And we could do something similar for the economies of Iraq and Syria and Afghanistan, when their wars will be over. Rather than creating new homes for people, we could make their homes livable. While the U.S. and international organizations could help, the countries must have the will to change. Syria was stable for decades, and being led by a minority group had resulted in it being the most open country in that region. The history is there; it's a matter of bringing that back. In Afghanistan a stable government was nearly attained after the Russians left, but one of the warlords backed out and allowed the Taliban to take Kabul and start to impose religious government on the country, which brought into question whether Afghanistan wanted decent government again.

Who should live where is a very complicated matter, but when people are forced to migrate problems often arise. That's what happened with Genghis Khan, but that was triggered by climate change as the Medieval Warm Period was coming to its end. If I omitted your favorite bit of forced migration, please forgive me; I had to omit a lot.


http://www.sciencealert.com/the-worl...tries-on-earth

Ethnic and religious groups in Syria
http://syriancivilwarmap.com/ethnic-...oups-of-syria/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Demographics_of_Syria

Demographic groups of Afghanistan
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ethnic...in_Afghanistan