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| MiguelB https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/ |
A Green-leaning woman asked me at a
stall today about our immigration policy.
She was concerned about the impact a
growing population will have on the countryside.
Unfortunately a growing population
will risk creating negative environmental impact wherever it happens. As soil degradation
and sea levels increase, the population pressures on the land are going to be
greater. The greater the poverty in a region, the greater the risk of conflict.
Both contribute to migration.
We need to stop thinking ‘us’ and ‘them’;
‘our’ country and ‘their’country. The essential point of ecology is that the
world is a single unit, that what happens in Antartica or Syria or China
happens to us all. We have become
accustomed to think of countries and nations, but these are not natural occurrences.
When we are concerned about environmental impact we need to think across
borders.
At a philosophical level too, every
human being is born on Earth and surely has a right to be anywhere on this
planet.
As Natalie Bennett, Green Party
leader, says over and over, we need to solve the environmental crisis first and
foremost. We also need to spread consumption evenly, so that the poor consume a
little more and the rich consume a lot less. These two achievements will have a
much greater impact on migration than a few laws about who can and can’t cross
a particular political border.
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