Monday, February 6, 2023
My newspaper had two headlines in two consecutive days. The first headline of Thursday 2 February was the increasing support for walls and reinforced fences as the solution to the migrant crisis from both the centre-right of the European Parliament as well as a number of EU Member States. The second headline at Friday 3 February described the excessive profits of Shell and other energy giants to the amounts of tens of billions of euro’s that they apparently intend to pay out to their shareholders. In light of the fact that much of that was earned over the backs of millions of people suffering under energy poverty, this rightly caused an outrage in society and politics. What was lacking was any reflection or comment on the connection between these excessive profits and the migrant crisis. Of course there is in general no one-to-one direct connection between these two facts. However a lot of comments and outrage over these excessive profits going to shareholders pointed to this as a symptom of a broken economic system. A system that is continuously increasing the proportion of the economy going to shareholders and the financial sector and decreasing the proportion that is received as salaries for working people. The Dutch Central Planning Bureau (CPB) reported that they expected that this year the labour income ratio would decrease to its lowest point since the sixties (aside from the exceptional years 2006-2008). Moreover they reported that this is already a long-term global trend, something the ILO confirms. In August 2022 the Janus Henderson Global Dividend Index (JHGDI) published that the second quarter of 2022 saw the highest record ever of dividends paid out to shareholders and this trend continued in the third quarter. The dominance of shareholders in the economy creates a situation that leads to extraction as primary mechanism in our economy in order to create continuous increasing dividends. Clearly, this is not only putting ever more pressure on workers but also on SME’s and natural resources. Profits are being extracted from people and planet to satisfy the continuing demand for ever higher dividends. It should be obvious that this is an unsustainable situation. How is this connected to the migration and asylum crisis? Congolese Nobel Prize winner Dr. Denis Mukwege, in an interview in The Netherlands in 2021, stated that mining of Cobalt and Coltan was necessary for green technologies but that gangs and the unethical behavior of major companies denied a decent salary to those who are working in the mines in Congo. Instead tens of thousands of children are being exploited as 70% of all Cobalt originates from Congo. This is just one example (out of many) how the single focus at short-term profit is denying those outside Europe the possibility for creating a future where that should be possible. We cannot expect walls and fences to be a solution if our own economic system is one major cause for continuing migration. However we find it almost normal that multinationals and big business have a massive lobby to water down proposals that would enforce due diligence and clamp down on human rights violations and environmental destruction in the production chain of these companies. We find it normal that profitability trumps everything and we don’t realise how much it contributes to migration and climate change and therefore to costs for taxpayers here. At the same time, those benefiting most from this process contribute the least to paying for the costs it creates. The EU and EU Member States foreign policy adds insult to injury by having a policy that is focused on creating higher profits for our businesses and (therefore) appeasement to aggressive regimes. For example; Josep Borrell, EU foreign policy head, still wants a nuclear deal with Iran that would lift economic sanctions. He must be aware that this would fund the Iranian Revolutionary Guard (IRGC) as it owns much of the Iranian economy. The Iranian military expansion in Iraq, Syria and Lebanon as well as Yemen contributed already to significant migration flows to Europe and the nuclear deal that Borrell aims for, would make it worse. Sadly more examples in this pattern could be added. How to change this? It is understandable that Member States on the edge of the EU with little leverage over EU economic and foreign policy find themselves in a situation where they see no other alternative than walls and fences. Indeed, as the Member States with the largest economies are driving policies that add to migration, they are not in a moral position to be judgmental over other Member States when it comes to building walls. Moreover these Member States act well within their sovereign democratic mandate if they decide this. At the same time it is clear that this will not really be a solution as EU policy (regardless the latest EU decision to go in that direction). Building these reinforced fences and walls along all these borders will take years and we cannot build a wall in the Mediterranean. But it is also not a solution if we take a fuller picture of cause and effect into consideration. It is not sustainable to have a ‘no borders’ policy of unfettered migration and at the same time ‘walls and fences’ are not a sustainable solution for excessive migration. Migrants cannot be blamed for trying to enter Europe but unlimited migration is simply not bearable as it lacks democratic support and our systems are unable to deal with it (which also has real consequences for real people). The deeper problem beneath this is that we have an economy and related foreign affairs that are not aligned with our core values. Article 1 of the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights states: ,,Human dignity is inviolable. It must be respected and protected.” From that fundamental perspective we cannot continue with driving forward an economic and foreign policy that is denying freedom and a decent future to millions around the globe. That is why a different economic and foreign policy is ultimately the most effective solution for excessive migration. Those outside and inside the EU are all human beings of equal value. As Sallux we promote a relational understanding of human dignity as foundation for all policy making. This is rooted in Christian faith and Europe’s Christian heritage and can be understood by people of all faiths and none. From here we advocate for a relational economy of mutuality and a foreign policy that supports fundamental freedoms as described in the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. This principle does not automatically lead for anyone in the world to go and have the right to live in Europe but it does mean that we work for a world that is liveable anywhere people are. That is why we launched our new youtube clip that promotes this approach to a wide audience. That is why we warmly invite you to the European Africa Agenda Symposium at 5 April. The EU needs to go back to its roots to find answers for today’s challenges. Any policy that is not rooted in our deepest values will not provide a durable solution. However if we can make that turn we will act according to our values and therefore create policies that help our families in Europe and globally. With sincere Christian greetings, Johannes de Jong