A Problem in Theory

…Is not always a problem in practice

Theory is a wonderful thing, but it is also the bane of the past 200 years. Theorization provides us with a wonderful tool for unscrambling the world around us, and for thinking through change, for moving society forward. Theory is the engine at the heart of the dialectic, the process through which progress is attained through the iterative accommodation of theory to reality.

That’s how it works, in theory. In practice human beings are not especially fond of giving up on theories in which they have invested so much energy and pride. The story of the 20th Century was largely the story of unconstrained theories, written in blood: Communism, Nazism, Fascism, even the new left hippie/yippie ideology of the 1960s. All these things were the predictable results of unconstrained theory hitting the constraints of the real world.

One of the major problems with the contemporary liberal social worldview is that it refuses to recognize constraints. Just wish it so and it can be so! If a 10% tax rate yields $100, then a 90% tax rate will yield $900, no? If we want homosexuals to “marry,” just change the definition of marriage to include gays. And call it a “right.” Easy. It is this willful blindness to the innate constraints of nature and of human nature that causes liberal policy to fail on a consistent basis, routinely producing results very, very different than those desired. And they seem not to learn from their experiences. It is as if tried and true realities about incentives, economics and the nature of human nature have no place in the worldview at all. It is as if anything which denies the malleability or perfectability of human beings cannot be permitted.

Conservatives are generally more willing to allow for the constraints of human nature, and less inclined to stubbornly follow theory. If one reads the founding documents of modern democratic capitalism (a.k.a. “conservatism”) they are largely an explicit effort to marry Anglo-Scottish political and economic theory with the proven constraints of human society, the weakness of human nature, and the susceptibility of corruption, and to build systems which accommodate them. The joint successes of the U.S. Constitution and the free market economic system are eloquent testimony to how well this approach has worked. I think it is fair to say that to the degree that conservative policy accounts for the constraints of reality, and the less it is infatuated by theory, the more successful it tends to be.

But sometimes some conservatives lose this balance of common sense and reasonable expectations. The immigration debate is one of these areas. The fervor of opinion both pro and con is intense. People care, deeply.But I believe that the current situation regarding immigration (legal and illegal) is first and foremost a problem in theory, rather than in fact. In theory, there are “jobs Americans won’t do.” In theory “Illegal aliens are undercutting the job market.” In theory, the American economy will collapse if you removed the 12 million illegal Mexican residents. In theory, “Family values don’t stop at the Rio Grande.” In theory, we need a “dramatic overhaul” of our immigration laws.

In practice none of these things are true or even terribly relevant. We have whipped up a contentious debate based on worries and theories and none of it really matters. Because things will stay roughly the same regardless of what “solution” we decide to impose. The forces driving illegal immigration are much larger than any law we can pass. Until Mexico solves its economy (which it is making some progress towards doing) people will stream towards a better life in America. And we need to do the best job we can of keeping them out and kicking them out when we catch them. And that’s the cold reality of it all.

I actually sympathize with the “anti” side of this debate. There are legitimate concerns about the potential cultural impact of an undiluted and non-assimilating slug of foreigners in our midst. But as far as I can tell, virtually all of the problems, issues and concerns can be addressed just fine simply by enforcing existing law.

There are only two changes I would make that even relate to immigration. First, we need to change the granting of citizenship to children of illegal aliens who happen to be born within our boundaries. This is a perverse incentive and is an outdated artifact of founding times, when what constituted a citizen of the “United States” was a fuzzy concept. We should seek to change it so that there are two and only two ways to become a citizen: be born to a citizen or be naturalized. Second, we should legislate the status of English as the only official language of the nation, and require that all official government business (including voting) be transacted in English.

And then let us stumble forward in our best possible form, living with the constraints of reality, knowing that immigration will find its own level, knowing that our country will not be irrevocably harmed, and spend our precious energy on other issues.

Let us embrace reality and turn away from theory.

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