no borders is explicitly anti capitalist (and anarchist?) - so we not calling for the end of one, or some borders, but all borders. the borders round the rich west which divide us economically and socially from the rest of the world are the ones we concentrate on for obvious reasons. "economic" migration would probably end when we end capitalism, but since that isn't likely to be anytime soon, we campaign around the many issues of migrants from outside the eu/us zone who reside there.

climate refugees are likely to be an increasing fact of life. when bangladesh sinksbecause of western produced carbon emissions - whats your reaction going to be?

I can try a quick answer:
1) Nobody wants to go where there is mass starvation. Historically, everywhere, the influx of migrants has been influenced by the availability of jobs, housing etc. When the house is full, people stop coming. No country has ever sunk under the weight of too many immigrants.
2) Why don't you ask why the UK and the other European countries keep pillaging other countries' resources? Why are they fuelling wars, making life impossible or at least very miserable for millions, selling weapons and torture equipment to the worst dictators, contributiong to climate change etc.? Don't you think many people would rather stay home with their families and friends rather than take long and perilious journies to contries they never seen but where they hope they can make a life? Considering most immigrants to the UK come from Africa and Asia, why would they leave immensely rich continents to come to a small island in the North that has nothing to compare? Does the world colonialism ring any bell?

...and another thing, do you than jusify making life a misery for others in order to stop them from coming? If this is not racism, how would you call it?

Thats my question when you see all around you mass starvation, poverty, war.....beyond trying to look from a management position look at the issue of the people which are being forced to flee or face a shitty existence. Therefore I agree with the previous posts, build movement against this pillage and destruction OR face a rightist/fascist governance in Europe to "deal" with the problem. Unfortunately, and it is not the best situation, that is what we are faced with - no easy answers and if anything more questions - but this is reality, there can be no freedom and diginified exists when a part of the population faces deportation, detention and poverty - the only solution is rebuild a collective sense of solidarity to solve these problems. At the end of the day, the more we are the greater the ability to make the most complex situation less complicated and therefore our only way to overcome the current system we are in.

Thanks for your question - I think it is something alot of people are asking and something No Borders Network would need to present a clear idea on.

Aren't just amazing the double standards of anti-immigration propaganda? Who are the ones who make millions of people starve? The 'great' owners of capital and their arse-licking governments in the West! They are the ones who pander racism and xenophobia and pave the way to fascist dictatorships...than they blame it all on the immigrants, like the new Immigration minister Phil Woolas.

If you believe in the implementation of the concept of "national interest" as a way to accumulate economical growth that then allow competitions between cities, regions and states. Then you want to have borders...

Since we all lives in nations and states in competion against eachother we also have a dying concept of free-market and free-trade > . You then got
the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) and Central America Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA).

Look at what Karl Marx is saying about FREE TRADE : >

Ok, while he sees that free trade COULD hasten the social revolution ( in 1848 maybe... certenly not now !!!) he compares FREE TRADE with EXPLOITATION ...Free trade is not that much different from wage slavery, and the free trade of goods happened within nations... goods are taxed on the borders ...

In the history (middle age) our word SALARY is actually coming from the word SALT, just because in the ancient "route of salt" the goods (the salt) had to pay a tax when crossing borders...

Later in history, in the name of FREE TRADE you had boats full of slaves, insured by Lloyds, crossing the ocean from Africa to the Carabbiens... That was the same time that all the European kings called one of the first European Congress and sit down all together at a table in Berlin between 1884–85 regulated European colonization and trade in Africa
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Berlin_Conference and set up on paper all the borders that currently we see in Africa.

That's why in between for example Ghana and Togo there are villages that are litteraly divided in two... on one side they speak ENGLISH and on the other side they speak FRENCH ?

So if you want to have borders and you want to implement the same neo-imperial policies where actually us european find their own roots then you want to go to the EU agency in Warsaw that conducts migrant hunting operations, trains border guards and special units to hunt down people crossing so-called "national borders" and which helps to coordinate and implement EU immigration policy. All under a project called FRONTEX
 http://europa.eu/agencies/community_agencies/frontex/index_en.htm

The notion of NOBORDERS , I think, want to put an historical criticism to the period that started in 1884-85 (the Berlin Conference ) and never ended.... (it is currently in Afghanistan and Iraq) ...

It doesn't want to promote precarity and wage slavery as the solution to the to poor immigrants that leave their land and countries to arrive to europe and struggle even more... but on the other hand, should be better able to question not only the notion of borders in our fortress europe but help promoting and disseminating a stronger notion of "self-reliance" and social solidarity.

The same model that , with Independently driven development policies and an anti-colonial political platform (like noborder), Thomas Sankara in 1983 started a revolution....

 http://flickr.com/photos/briziophoto/2467838816/

To conclude, in the same time that the Sans Papier in Paris are legalizing their dossiers in order to become european, and adopt our decadent and dying neo-liberal political status... we want to question the very root of the diaspora and why there is more immigration now than 20 years ago... and what happened after 10 years of IMF structural policies in Afrika, together with Tony fucking Blair and the Bono&Golf-dog spectacle of "poverty history"... That same debt ( the IMF and World Bank one) that is now at the root of the credit crunch !!!

So let's be proactive and help people to get out ot the fucking DETENTION CENTRES !!!! and then we can talk with them about our future together in this fucked up society !!!

 http://www.sanspapiers.internetdown.org/


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"The question of debt is the question of Africa’s economic situation, as much as peace; this question is an important condition of our survival," Sankara said as president.
"The debt cannot be repaid. If we do not pay, our creditors will not die. We can be sure of that. On the other hand, if we pay, it is we who will die. Of that we can be equally sure."

 http://www.dominionpaper.ca/articles/1599

here is Marx's quote... got cut off...
from :
 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Free_trade


For example, Karl Marx wrote in The Communist Manifesto, "The bourgeoisie... has set up that single, unconscionable freedom -- Free Trade. In one word, for exploitation, veiled by religious and political illusions, it has substituted naked, shameless, direct, brutal exploitation." However, Karl Marx later reversed such a position, and began supporting free trade, saying in a speech in 1848: But, in general, the protective system of our day is conservative, while the free trade system is destructive. It breaks up old nationalities and pushes the antagonism of the proletariat and the bourgeoisie to the extreme point. In a word, the free trade system hastens the social revolution. It is in this revolutionary sense alone, gentlemen, that I vote in favor of free trade.

This is a very good question. You only have to read the Sun or listen to people talking on the bus to realise it is a common way of thinking, encouraged by the mass media.

It seems to be two complaints:

1) basic lack of space, with green belts being eaten up for housing.
2) "preferential" treatment for new arrivals - people thinking they are all put to the front of the queue and housed in mansions.

You can talk abstract political theory all you want but I think it needs to be dumbed down to speak to the average Sun reader. The problem is that the mass media have so much power that countering their propaganda is very difficult.

There is possibly a racist element but I think that is mainly due to the fact that most white immigrants are professionals from places like the US, South Africa and Australia - there aren't many white economic or political migrants. East Europeans are seen as "non-white" in this context. So I think the discrimination is mainly class-based, which happens to coincide with skin colour.

It is really a symptom of a larger problem, which is global inequality. People in places like the UK don't want to think they have to give up their consumerist lifestyle in order that people in other countries can raise their standards of living. But this isn't an easy argument to "sell" to people, since it goes against their own self-interest.

What I like to say to people who agree with borders is why stop at nations? How about border controls on each county? Each town? Most people are pissed off at invasive searches and delays at customs so we can point out that borders will make life difficult for them too.

Just some random thoughts, hope someone finds them interesting. I can't see any easy solutions though.

Does this make me a nazi? - Is your racist propaganda different to nazi scum?

In response to anonymous's post "don't feed the racist!":

I think you are being too knee-jerk with this (maybe you are just trolling, but I don't think so). To me it seems clear that the original article is from someone anti-racist who is just trying to see the issues from the perspective of other people. This is a valuable exercise.

Mass immigration is a complex issue, which has many sides, racism being one. Overpopulation and overcrowding are valid issues, and are independent of racist issues. Racists might use overpopulation as an excuse for their racism, but that doesn't make it any less of an issue.

If I said to you that you had to put up four people from overseas on the floor of your bedroom for the foreseeable future, would it make you a racist if you objected? Were the native Americans racist to object to European settlers colonising their lands?

Personally, I am against all borders and governments, and against all racism. But I can understand that some people see things from a very selfish perspective of how it impacts on their life. Where racism comes in is when people criticise (non-white) immigrants who move here, but not natives who breed like rabbits, or where they criticise non-white immigrants more than white immigrants.

My personal experience has been that most ordinary people are fine with immigrants once they get to know them. It's those in power like politicians and the mass media that want to use racism as a divide and rule tactic.

The problem the original poster asks will solve itself eventually by making the UK less attractive to move to. But understandably, people don't like the idea of their home becoming an unattractive place to live! They don't see, or don't want to see, or don't care, that it is part of global inequality correcting itself.

.. for the info, which clarified what you are about.
Certainly no-one would accuse NoBorders of short-termism!
I still don't quite see how you can maintain the position that checking, processing, detaining etc. are wrong, under the present circumstances (i.e. before capitalism and borders have faded away). Surely, if those repressive measures were withdrawn unilaterally, well we're back to my original question...
Thanks anyway.