Paschos Mandravelis on market-distorting border fences

National governments can't stop migration flows with traditional means because migration is a consequence of the globalised economy, Paschos Mandravelis writes in the conservative daily Kathimerini in view of Greece's plans to erect a fence along part of its border with Turkey: "In fact technology makes certain processes cheaper and the economy renders ineffective political approaches that have been practiced for centuries. That includes for example the national Keynesian policies. Today billions are transferred from one stock market to the next with the click of a mouse. The same goes of course for measures involving national borders. The US never stops building new fences along the Mexican border, yet California is full of economic migrants. All over the world countries are simply having a hard time coming to terms with today's realities conditioned by new technologies and exploited by the markets. We shouldn't forget that economic migration is a basic part of market development. With this in mind it's clear that the migration problem can't be analysed on the basis of the ideological concepts of the past. ... Border fences distort the free market."

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