Welcome to Open Borders!

This website is dedicated to making the case for open borders. The term “open borders” is used to describe a world where there is a strong presumption in favor of allowing people to migrate and where this presumption can be overridden or curtailed only under exceptional circumstances. Use the drop-down menus to explore the case for open borders and the many objections that have been raised.

As of now, the references in the website largely focus on immigration to the United States, but most of the arguments are fairly general and country-independent. In a world with open borders, the majority of migration flows will be from less developed to more developed countries, hence many of the arguments for and against open borders implicitly assume that this is the sort of migration that is being discussed.

The website avoids much discussion of topical or country-specific political issues, and even avoids country-specific policy proposals (though many of the references and linked articles/blog posts do go into country-specific details). The goal is to build the intellectual and moral case for open borders as a generic proposition for the long term.