This paper investigtes the ethics of violent resistance at the border. Several recent contributions argue that migrants can always resist their exclusion in self-defense if their exclusio n is substantively unjust. I argue that this conclusion is based on an implausible application of the theory of self-defense to the migration context. I show that states can sometimes legitimately enforce unjust immigration restrictions and that the legitimate enforcement of unjust immigration restrictions does not justify resistance in self-defense.

I have presented a version of this paper at the 12th Braga Meetings in Ethics and Political Philosophy in 2022.

Building on aspects of Kant’s political thought, this paper develops a novel argument for the view that states have political obligations towards refugees. This argument shows that the systematic critical potential of the Kantian perspective extends beyond Kant’s limited comments concerning cosmopolitan law and the rights of strangers. The paper contributes to the ongoing debate about the so-called duty of rescue paradigm, according to which states merely have humanitarian duties towards refugees. This debate is relevant for the normative evaluation of current systems of refugee protection, as humanitarian obligations are generally considered to be substantially weaker than political obligations. By emphasizing states’ political obligations towards refugees – their duties of right rather than virtue – this paper aims to highlight normative shortcomings of current systems of refugee protection.

I have presented this project at the ‘Refugees and the Duty of Rescue Conference’ in Durham in 2022 and the Workshop ‘Migration, Vulnerability, and Women’ in Hamburg in 2022.

In this paper, I investigate the plausibility of a popular methodology in moral and political philosophy for justification of moral rights, which is based on the so-called interest theory of rights. This interest-based methodology is also prominent in the migration ethics literature, where it has been employed to justify both a right to global freedom of movement and a right to restrict immigration.I diagonse a substantial structural flaw in how this methodology is typically applied, which threatens to undermine the results of a broad range of normative theoretical contributions. I then develop a strategy for fixing this flaw that is based on the idea that rights essentially function as heuristics in our practical reasoning.

I have presented this project at the conference ‘Collective Decision-Making and Democratic Institutions’ at Universität Hanburg in 2023.

In this paper, I develop a new account of the enforceability of moral duties. This account explains why duties differ in their enforceability, a phenomenon that has recently been deemed to pose a profound philosophical puzzle. This paper contributes to my larger research project on the political legitimacy of immigration restrictions because the enforcement of moral duties is often taken to be an important justification for the exercise of political power.

I have presented this project in the Colloquium in Practical Philosophy at LMU Munich in May 2024.