ABSTRACT
This book is about immigration policy. It concentrates on what I call normal migrants, i.e. migrants who do not have a legal right to admission. Normal migrants may be admitted when benefi cial to the receiving country. Yet there is no legal duty to admit them, contrary to migrants with a right to admission (e.g. refugees, family members of a permanent resident). This book starts with the simple observation that today authorities believe they can deny normal migrants admission to a country without giving them proper justifi cation for their exclusion. The central objective of this book is to challenge this current practice and call for a change in admission laws and policies. First, when authorities are denying normal migrants admission they must justify the exclusion vis-à-vis the excluded migrant. Second, if the authorities fail to give proper justifi cation to the normal migrant they cannot refuse his admission. Third, in principle it is up to the authorities to come up with the relevant facts and reasons to substantiate their denial of admission. In other words, the authorities carry the fi rst burden of proof. The admission logic is to be reversed. Finally, the adequacy of the justifi cation is to be measured against the yardstick of the proportionality principle, especially the necessity test. The authorities must have shown that the exclusion is necessary to obtain the objectives of the immigration policy and that exclusion was the only and the least burdensome measure available. Ultimately, it should be up to the courts to check whether the exclusion satisfi es the necessity test.
