By Yiler Huang
In the movie Elysium, Elysium is a large space station with its government, laws, and pathway to citizenships. In order to become a citizen of Elysium, you have to pay money to get a ticket and an ID. This makes it so only rich people can become a citizen of Elysium. As the poor are not citizens of Elysium, it created a class imbalance where only the rich are able to have the benefits while the poor have to suffer and die. While the citizenship process on Elysium was very extreme, I think citizenship should still be earned and not given.
Countries with an extremely relaxed citizenship process are harder to manage by the government and that might limit the growth of the counties in different areas. A good example of a country undergoing problems due to their immigration laws is Argentina, the country has no language requirement and no tests for people who want to become a citizen. This may have contributed to Argentina's crime rates and poverty. “Citizens from Peru and Paraguay are coming here and they end up killing one another over control of the drug trade…” Stated by Security Minister Patricia Bullrich. This quote shows that, despite having the world’s most relaxed immigration process, Argentina may not be drawing workers of high skill or people willing to contribute to the economy. “Argentina’s… government is providing another set of data… and points to foreigners as being responsible for the most serious crimes, particularly drug trafficking.” Showing much of Argentina’s current problems are cost by their immaigration policy.
I believe that having a strict immigration policy will allow better control of the population, because people need to work for it. Which means this will draw people that are serious about contributing to the economy, a good example of this would be Liechtenstein. The country has one of the most strict immigration laws, and it is one of the world’s richest countries. “Liechtenstein is the world's sixth smallest country, with a population of just 37,129. The country, whose name means “bright stone” in German, has the highest gross domestic product per person in the world.” This shows having strict immigration laws can filter out the people that are really beneficial to the country and also controls the population from being overcrowded, giving equal opportunities to all its citizens.
The movie Elysium shows the problem of going into the extreme when it comes to approval of immigration. In Elysium, the system is too skewed to a demographic with higher income. Not allowing the chance for people to prove themselves and only passing out IDs for a large sum of money. While the system of Elysium was not the best, it sounded ideal as it only allowed people to enter to give it a higher standard of living. We see countries like Argentina have easy immigration policies but at the same time it also has high crime rates and high levels of poverty. On the other hand Liechtenstein has one of the strictest immigration processes but they do not limit it to people of certain income. Insead they accept who they think best would preserve the country's culture as well as contributing to its growth. This is why I think that earning your citizenship creates a better social environment than having it given.
References:
Cué, C. E. (2017, January 30). Argentina adopts anti-immigrant rhetoric over public safety fears. EL PAÍS English Edition. https://english.elpais.com/elpais/2017/01/30/inenglish/1485790480_617895.html
Seminara, D. (2015, October 28). Lessons from Liechtenstein: More Referendums Please. CIS.Org. https://cis.org/Seminara/Lessons-Liechtenstein-More-Referendums-Please