Asian-Arab philosophical dialogues on globalization, democracy ...

The real problem is how to justify the high price of medicine in developed countries. There is a kind of
dilemma. On one hand, higher prices will not cost much to rich countries, except a lack of legitimacy of
enforcing intellectual property rights. On the other hand, on the basis that now the medicines exist, this
fact puts pressure on rich countries to take into account “elementary considerations of humanity”, as it
says in another context of the international penal court.
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Asia-<strong>Arab</strong> Philosophical Dialogues on Globalization, Democracy and Human Rights
Immigration and Refugees
These elementary considerations of humanity are not respected in the case of refugees and immigrants.
To maximise electoral support many European countries have restricted the entry to their respective
states. In 1978, Mrs. Thatcher said on TV that Britain was in danger of being “really rather swamped”; i.e.
submerged by people of Caribbean and Indian “origin”. Of course there were no danger at all, “countries
which have accepted refugees by the million have been the poorest ones: Pakistan, Ethiopia” 34 but her
speech, as Michael Dummett says “deliberately encouraged hostile feelings against Commonwealth
immigrants already in the country”. 35 The same happens in France with the Pasqua Laws in 1993. These
laws “withdrew the right to work from asylum-seekers and imposed sanctions on carrying companies”.
They also “rescinded the right of those who had come to France as children to remain in France upon
reaching their maturity”. The effect being that the law leaves people not knowing if they are French or
not. In 2007 the government of President Sarkozy voted through a law called the French Immigration
Law, which put restrictions and obstacles for those applying for immigration to France on the basis of
joining family already there. 36 The person has to submit oneself to a DNA test to prove that he or she is
the real son or the real daughter of the mother whom they want to join.
All these restrictions push more and more people towards illegal immigration. This is a very difficult
reality we have to face:
“Being in the country illegally, they [the illegal immigrants] are denied the rights to social security, to
health care, to work and so on, that everybody ought to have and that it is the will of the state that
everyone should have; and they are also at the mercy of exploiters, who pay them derisory wages or
drive them into prostitution by threatening to reveal their illegal presence to authorities”. 37
This is the substantial poverty as A. Sen defined it, the privation of capabilities. A good quality of life
and the lasting possession of one’s own self and abilities leading to happiness, is but a dream for these
people. They are restricted to living in developed countries beneath a glass ceiling everyday to observe
from below the way of life from which they are deprived and for which they have to pretend to be
something else, to serve. “They have the rights that others, as far as lies on their power, should help
them to enjoy the conditions for such lives to the best possible extent”. 38
Concluding Remarks
How can we build bridges instead of walls? The challenges that globalization poses to philosophy were
often summed up in two words: education and democracy. We have to add respect, even if it is included
in democracy, because some of its features are often neglected. We have to add it because respect is not
merely to tolerate the opinion of others. It is also to take care of them, to facilitate their access to good
life, good health, affirmation of dignity, etc. This commitment is an emergency for countries, especially
developed states which have easy access to medicine and whose long experience in democracy, mainly
the United States and Europe, cannot fit together with restrictions on human rights, nor with the
stigmatization of any human group on the basis of its religion, or its nationality.
34 Dummett, M. 2001. Immigration and Refugees. London, Routledge, p.36
35 Dummett, M. 2001. Immigration and Refugees. London, Routledge, p.116.
36 http://www.edri.org/edrigram/number4.20/dna-french-immigration-law
37 Idem, p.71.
38 Idem, p.26.