The SBS series Go Back to Where You Came From had the great merit of touching the imagination of viewers and participants. It created space for a thoughtful conversation about asylum seekers and the Malaysia solution.
That space is also needed to reflect on the ethical issues at stake in the Malaysia solution. I shall outline my argument that it is not morally justifiable and what follows from that conclusion. Others may disagree. But the subsequent conversation may then illuminate points of divergence about the importance of moral considerations in public policy, and about the principles that make a policy right or wrong.
The starting point of my argument lies in an understanding of human dignity. It argues that each human being is precious, and must be treated as an end in herself, and not as a means to an end. Our dignity must be respected because we are human, not because we are Australian, Christian or whatever.
What respect for human dignity entails can be spelled out in terms of human flourishing. If they are to flourish, human beings need security, shelter, food, health, education, freedom of belief and expression, and a society to belong to and contribute to. The absence of such conditions is reflected in physical and mental distress.
For the argument, too, it is axiomatic that human beings can only flourish within society. We are diminished without families, schools, markets, places of conversation and governments. If we can live with human dignity only because we are supported in a network of structured relationships, we are bound also to ensure that our society respects the human dignity of all others, and particularly those whose flourishing is threatened.
This obligation falls on us as individuals and citizens, and on the governments through whom our obligations to those distant from ourselves are coordinated. That obligation is measured by the extent to which it is reasonably possible for people or institutions to meet it. That is why some obligations can be discharged only through international cooperation. But citizens are responsible for demanding their governments act ethically.
This is the basis for reflecting on what respect for the human dignity of refugees entails. The ethical obligation of society to respect the human dignity of refugees is roughly codified in the provisions of the United Nations Convention on the status of refugees. It commits signatory states to offer protection to claimants who are found to be refugees.
Measured by this ethical framework, Australia does show respect for the human dignity of those whom it brings to Australia as refugees. This is a gesture of international cooperation to protect those whose human dignity is not respected in their own nations.
But Australia fails in many ways in respect for the human dignity of those who come to Australia, particularly by boat, to make their claim for refugee status. Prolonged detention has led to mental trauma and often to prolonged mental illness. When detention and other measures are deployed as a means of deterrence, they are doubly wrong because they infringe the human dignity of asylum seekers in order to gain a broader end.
Supporters of the Malaysian solution have advocated it as an instrument for sharing international responsibility for refugees. It involves Australia accepting up to 5000 asylum seekers in Malaysia, who have been declared to be refugees but who have not yet found a country that will offer them protection. In return Australia will send up to 1000 asylum seekers to Malaysia without adjudicating or accepting their claims for protection.
The morality of this proposal must be judged by the extent to which it respects the human dignity of the asylum seekers whom Australia proposes to send to Malaysia. Because human dignity is inviolable and non-transferrable, any disrespect for their human human dignity cannot be justified by the benefits received by others involved in the policy. Their claim on Australia for protection cannot be transferred to others.
This means that the proposal can be ethically justified only if it guarantees to those sent to another country as high a level of protection as they would find in Australia. For all asylum seekers this means adequate food, shelter, medical care, security and support for family groups. For refugees, it also means as prompt acceptance into a society with opportunity to build a new life there as they would find in Australia.
These are the minimal ethical demands of a regional solution. Most discussion has turned on whether the basic conditions of human dignity will be guaranteed in Malaysia. But even if the Malaysian government guaranteed the security, sustenance and education of the asylum seekers, the human dignity of those found to be refugees would still be significantly infringed. They would be unable to enter Malaysian society equally, and they have no possibility of prompt acceptance into another society. The claim that they justly make on Australia for the protection of their human dignity is therefore contravened.
This failure to respect the human dignity of claimants could only be ethically justified if the burden that Australia incurred by offering protection were unreasonable, either absolutely, or in comparison with neighbouring nations. Any comparative statistics make that claim unsustainable.
The Malaysian solution raises further ethical question for those who judge it to fail the requirements of respecting human dignity. As citizens, they would be expected to make clear their moral judgment of the policy. If they are involved in discussing and implementing it, they would not be able to take any active part in implementing processes that involve disrespect for the human dignity of the people involved. But they might properly be involved in attempting to mitigate the effects of the disrespect for human dignity involved in it.
That is my argument. Of course it is open to question at many points. Some will argue that all ethical positions are relative and so irrelevant. Others may assert that it is arbitrary to speak of inalienable human dignity. It might also be argued that only individuals have ethical obligations, not groups or nations, or that we have moral responsibilities only to our own, and not to strangers.
Some may claim that it is legitimate to infringe the human dignity of one group of people in order to benefit a larger number. Some may claim that in dealing with governments one must leave behind one’s ethical principles and be pragmatic.
But I expect that there is something to be said for aiming at consistency between our ethical principles, our actions and our hopes for national life. That is the presumption of any ethical discussion.
Andrew Hamilton is consulting editor of Eureka Street.