Race, History, and Spatial Politics: Making a Case for Broadening the Membership Rights of Long-Term Resident Moroccan Immigrants in Spain

Contemporary legal and political developments have facilitated the expansion of the rights of the EU alien (i.e. an individual who resides in an EU Member State other than her Member State of birth) and conversely, limited the rights of non-EU aliens (i.e. third country nationals). While much has been written on this “rights gap,” there is very limited work on what rights non-EU aliens should be entitled to, and why. To help fill this void, this paper makes the case for providing long-term resident Moroccan immigrants in Spain broader membership rights than third country nationals are allotted under EU law. My point of departure for formulating this normative claim is political scientist Roger Smith’s “principle of constituted identities,” which imposes on constitutional democracies an ethical obligation to help fulfill the aspirations (including preferred forms of membership) of those identities they have coercively shaped. Given the uniquely shared historical ties between Spain and Morocco, characterized by asymmetrical power relations, I argue that long-term resident Moroccan immigrants in Spain have through various historical events been reduced to their labor function, and this in turn has been reified in a contemporary sense through Spanish legal and policy mechanisms governing immigration, and relatedly, terrorism and national security. In so doing, I also complicate Smith’s theory by empirically demonstrating the central role of race in constituting identities, resulting in the creation and eventual hardening of racialized hierarchical forms of membership.