Are we taking our ‘fair share’ of refugees and asylum seekers?
It’s the number one question asked by populations in every country receiving refugees and asylum seekers. This article illustrates alternative ways of answering using the UK as an example. Then we ask: is it a sensible question to ask in the first place? The answer to that leads to interesting conclusions applicable to any country.
It is a question that rages on social media. Here are just a few examples of typical arguments with respect to the UK taken from threads on Facebook:
N.D. “The UK takes less asylum seekers than most other countries, we are way down the table.”
AB: “[We take less] than who!? Oh yes Germany, France and Spain. Who all voted for open borders and the UK did not! Get a map, compare the size of the UK against these countries. Do the sums.”
JC: “It’s common sense, this country is a small island with too many people and we are overwhelmed.”
GM: “We are full to the brim. Britain is half the size of France with the same population.”
So who is right? How does the UK compare with other countries around the globe in terms of the number of asylum seekers who come to the UK (and refugees it approves), and is it fair?
According to UNHCR, as of mid-2021 (the latest statistics available), there were 135,912 refugees in the UK[i]. Using this figure, we can see that, to date, the UK has taken roughly 0.5% of the 27 million world’s refugees.
But is 0.5% more or less than the UK’s fair share? Finding an answer to this is reminiscent of the process once used by psychologists to try and fathom a person’s mental state. They would show someone an ink blot and ask what they saw. People saw a full range of things — monsters, dolphins, trees, fish, and so on, the possibilities were infinite. How they chose to look at the blot was meant to reveal more about them than anything inherent in the blot.
The criteria we select for determining how we look at relative responsibility is all important to whatever conclusion is reached.
If we decide that responsibility should be determined by comparative wealth then the UK has, without doubt, taken less than its fair share of the world’s current refugees: the UK enjoys 3.26% of the world’s GDP[ii] which means on this criterion alone it is taking about one sixth of the numbers that it should.
Similarly, if we argue that a country should take refugees in line with its population, on the basis that a larger population should be able to absorb greater numbers, then, again, the UK should be taking more. It has 0.85% of the world’s population (but is only taking 0.5% of the world’s refugees).
But some argue that a larger population means a country should be taking less, rather than more, if it has limited space. So, what happens if we consider population density?
The UK occupies only 0.2% of the worlds land mass[iii] and ranks quite high: 50th out of 234 countries in terms of population density[iv]. So, if high population density is used to justify taking less asylum seekers, it is taking more than its fair share.
So far, we have looked at the number of refugees the UK has already approved relative to those approved by other countries in the world. But you can argue, as many do, that what is of most relevance is not so much the numbers historically over the past few years but what is being done now, and, also, that the countries that should be compared to should be countries similar in terms of location and culture. Specifically for the UK, we should be looking at the numbers of new asylum seekers granted status most recently, compared to other countries in Europe. This gives us a different ink blot to look at, and again, depending which way you look at it, different conclusions can be drawn.
Figure 1 compares the UK with 32 other European sovereign states using the number of asylum seekers given status in 2021, and different criteria.
Figure 1. How the UK compares with other European sovereign states according to numbers of asylum seekers given permission to remain in 2021.
Source of raw statistics: Eurostat and UK office of National Statistics.
If you take absolute numbers alone, the UK was in fourth place behind Germany, France and Spain, quite high up in the table. But if you look at numbers taken per member of population, it was in 19th place — the UK has quite a high population relative to most countries in Europe so, arguably, should be taking a greater share of the responsibility. Doing the calculation by land mass it was in 11th place, just one place above France, which was 12th. This is because France, although geographically larger took a lot more asylum seekers. Calculating it by GDP/population the UK came in at 20th in the table —it is relatively rich compared to most countries in Europe. Finally doing it by population density — it came in in 9th position — the relatively high population density could be used as an argument to take less.
These are similar results to when we compared the UK to the world. Population size and relative wealth suggest that if fairness compared to other countries is our overriding criteria, the UK should be taking more responsibility than it is, but its relatively small geographical size, and population density, factor the other way.
So, how do we resolve this dilemma? By now it should be obvious this isn’t a simple matter — we have to decide first which numbers to compare. Should we be comparing the numbers of refugees in the UK or the number of recent asylum seekers? Should we be comparing with the rest of the world or just with Europe? And on what basis should we compare the UK to other countries: actual numbers, by population, landmass, population density, GDP, or what?
Many people in these debates settle on just one of the criteria and use this to justify the conclusion they have already reached. So, in the UK’s case, if you wanted less asylum seekers you could argue using the criteria of population density, and comparing the UK to Europe. If you wanted to justify taking more asylum seekers then you could use the criteria of relative wealth. The ink blot remains the same but people can give it whatever interpretation they want.
An additional problem with selecting just one criterion is that, in extremis, it leads to ridiculous conclusions. Noone in their right minds is suggesting all asylum seekers should be sent to Iceland (the European country with the lowest population density) and only once its density is brought up to the level of the second least densely populated country should the second country be considered. Nor are they arguing that all asylum seekers should be sent to the US until such a time as that country is no longer the richest. It makes no sense to apply one criterion alone. But if we argue for some package of criteria then we hit the difficulty of how to weight them relative to each other. For instance, should we give more weight to population density or wealth, or should we give equal weight to every factor? Should we add other factors? IN comparing factors we are not comparing like with like. The factors are very different and their relative importance remains a matter of opinion.
Does this mean, therefore, that we have reached a dead end and that the question of how many asylum seekers a country should take can never be resolved? No, I don’t think so, it just means we have been asking the wrong question.
Let’s go back and look at the original question: are we taking our fair share? We can see that there are a couple of underlying assumptions. First, in introducing the concept of fairness there is an implication that taking asylum seekers is necessarily onerous — otherwise why would it need to be shared out equally between countries using some concept of fairness? This in itself is a value judgement and overlooks the possibility that taking more asylum seekers may be of net benefit (or of benefit to some countries and less so to others). Second, the question assumes that comparison is a good basis for deriving ethical decisions.
Consider the following situation: you are standing with a group of people by the side of a lake. Suddenly you become aware of a child drowning, in deep water, a few feet away. Do you plunge in and save them, or do you stand on the bank, looking around and thinking: ‘it isn’t fair that I should be the one to go’? Most people would just plunge in. Most people are strongly motivated to help. Moral imperatives rise up from some place within them, irrespective of what others are doing, and in a situation like this, most people’s first impulse is to help.
The danger of comparing ourselves with others as a basis for deciding what to do, is that nobody takes a moral lead and collective standards fall. If everyone on the bank was using comparison as a basis for deciding what to do, inaction would result and the child drown. In comparing ourselves to others we sacrifice our agency to make our own moral decisions based on our own situation and our own capacity.
In 2015 the refugee crisis saw hundreds of thousands of asylum seekers escaping from Syria. Most of the nearby countries looked on in dismay without knowing what to do. They discussed whether or not they could afford to help or house these people, whether there would be work for them, whether it was their responsibility, and so on. They remained paralysed in uncertainty. But at a press conference Angela Merkel famously expressed her optimism in the simple words “We can do this!” The rest is history. Germany ended up taking almost a million asylum seekers at that time. In making her decision Angela Merkel did not compare Germany’s response to that of other countries. To have done so would have perpetuated the impasse, and Germany would have ended up taking far fewer asylum seekers in line with everyone else. She did not wait, in confusion on the bank, nervously watching everyone else. She took the moral lead, jumped in and rescued.
But wait a minute. There is an important caveat to our analogy of the group and the drowning child. What if you are unable to swim and know that in attempting to save the child you could drown yourself? In this case you are weighing up your own survival with that of the child and it puts a whole new slant on what to do. If you decide to go out of your depth and attempt save the child you could both die as a result.
So, could survival fears be a factor in the reluctance of some countries to exercise greater tolerance towards asylum seekers and are they of relevance in deciding how many asylum seekers to take? Lets look at this for the UK (but the analysis could apply to any country).
Consider the following recent comments on UK social media:
NS “These people won’t get a penny from me. I’m looking after an orphan and can’t even pay for a new fridge now that the last one is broken. Charity begins at home.”
AW: “So fair enough, but who’s going to pay for them, house them, feed them, educate them? Where’s the money coming from? What about refugees using the NHS [National Health Service] that they have never contributed to? The cost of living has sky rocketed. Where is the money coming from?”
AH “The sooner they get it [deporting people to Rwanda] started the better. Our NHS and housing stock can’t cope with the population we already have.”
These types of comments and many others like them are frequent on social media. It is clear many people in the UK do now worry about how they are going to meet their basic needs. Those that are low paid or on benefits fear an influx of asylum seekers will further compromise a welfare state already stretched to breaking point. If they are in work, particularly low paid work, and work that is contractually insecure, they fear an influx of asylum seekers will undermine what remains of their employee rights and conditions, and lead to lower pay. Worse, they fear they will lose their jobs to asylum seekers, or become homeless on account of increased pressure on the housing supply and rising rents and mortgages. If they become ill, they fear the extra demands placed on the NHS will further compromise its ability to treat them. In short, they have many anxieties about the future.
There is good evidence of a link between such anxieties and intolerance of immigration. A survey of Brexit voters found that only 14% thought that immigration was a ‘force for good’ compared to 57% of remain voters. The Brexit supporters were also found to be much more pessimistic about their own economic prospects than the Remainers.[v]
Similarly, a study of the fluctuating European economies found that anti-immigrant sentiments increased in countries where perceptions of economic insecurity also increased, and anti-immigrant sentiments decreased in countries where perceptions[vi] of economic insecurity declined.[vii]
For those with genuine survival fears it may, of course, be easier to fall back on arguments relating to how the UK compares, than to make embarrassing admissions about finding it hard to cope. But by including survival fears in the debate, we shift the analysis to a different realm. It becomes a question of capacity: of how many asylum seekers the population of a country collectively feels it can cope with, rather than the cruder question of how it compares with other countries.
Of course, to stretch the drowning child analogy, even if you don’t swim, it may be possible to help a drowning child without going out of your depth. Perhaps making the rescue won’t in fact be life threatening. Perhaps successfully rescuing the child will become a valid source of pride in yourself and what you have done so courageously. Perhaps the dangers have become exaggerated from the perspective of the bank.
Or perhaps they haven’t. Deciding whether greater tolerance towards asylum seekers, risks the way of life, livelihood and survival of UK residents, or whether it can be done in a way that might actually be of net benefit, are complex questions. There is evidence, however, that a major source of support for far-right parties in Europe has been the fear that immigration will erode welfare state benefits, housing and employment opportunities and that far-right parties have postulated a link between economic hardship and migration as a means of inciting populist fervour. Immigrants and refugees are presented as a net tax burden, out-competing existing residents for jobs and housing, making demands on public services, and reducing public resources. Such representations may well have been effective in shifting public opinion: when the welfare state is smaller as a proportion of GDP people are more likely to be hostile to immigrants.[viii] Support for anti-immigration parties has also been shown to be highly responsive to perceived scarcity resulting from immigrant receipt of ‘in-kind benefits’ such as health care, housing, child care and education.[ix] The accuracy, or not, of blaming asylum seekers for impacts on such benefits, and the economy generally, requires separate analysis beyond the scope of this article.
But for now, we can draw some conclusions. For those advocating a greater tolerance towards asylum seekers it is important not to fall into the trap of glossing over people’s genuine fears. It is all too easy to think that people’s resistance to asylum seekers is a simple case of racism or xenophobia. Clearly it is for some, but for many the roots of their intolerance lie in genuine anxieties. In playing ‘the race card’ those advocating greater tolerance run the risk of simply antagonising those that they are trying to persuade and inflaming the argument. A better strategy is to properly listen to people’s fears and anxieties and to support policies that ensure the survival needs of all citizens: decent housing and education for all, improved health care, a reasonable living wage, proper employee rights for those in work, and training and sufficient benefits for those that aren’t.
And, you might ask, how should this be done, who is going to pay for it?
Let us end with some familiar statistics: The richest 10% of the global population own 76% of all wealth, and in the UK, the 2021 Census revealed that the top 10% of households in the UK now hold 43% of all the wealth whilst the bottom 50% hold only 9%.[x]
An obvious and effective way of encouraging a broader based tolerance of asylum seekers, would be to redistribute wealth from the very rich into the welfare state.
[i] https://www.unhcr.org/uk/asylum-in-the-uk.html#:~:text=How%20many%20refugees%20are%20there,stateless%20persons%20in%20the%20UK.
It is not clear how the UNHCR derived this statistic because it is unclear when exactly a refugee is considered no longer a refugee through becoming a citizen. Problematically the process of redefining refugees differs from country to country. Last seen 17/7/22
[ii] https://www.worldometers.info/gdp/gdp-by-country/ 17/7/22
[iii] https://www.worldometers.info/geography/largest-countries-in-the-world/ 17/7/22
[iv] https://worldpopulationreview.com/country-rankings/countries-by-density 20/7/22
[v] Source: Lord Ashcroft Polls, 21–23 June 2016. See also The politics of social status: economic and cultural roots of the populist right Noam Gidron and Peter A. Hall: https://scholar.harvard.edu/files/hall/files/gidronhallbjs2017.pdf
[vi] In contrast, changes in objective economic conditions (i.e. unemployment rates) during the same period of time did not display the expected effects in a similarly robust way.
[vii] Kuntz et al 2017. The dynamic relations between economic conditions and anti-immigrant sentiment: A natural experiment in times of the European economic crisis. https://doi.org/10.1177/0020715217690434
[viii] Hatton, T. 2016. Immigration, public opinion, and the recession in Europe. Economic Policy, 31: 205–246.
[ix] Cavaille, C., & Ferwerda, J. 2017. How distributional conflict over public spending drives support for anti-immigrant parties. Unpublished paper, Georgetown University
[x]https://www.ons.gov.uk/peoplepopulationandcommunity/personalandhouseholdfinances/incomeandwealth/bulletins/totalwealthingreatbritain/april2018tomarch2020 2/8/22
