Migration is a powerful way to stop us ‘othering’ other humans, says author Felix Marquardt.
Marquardt is a French author, former PR consultant and senior advisor to world leaders and CEOs, some he admits shady.
His book The New Nomads proposes the future of humanity and the key to its enlightenment lies in re-embracing nomadism.
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“Migration is an incredible tool to allow us to stop othering each other and the othering of other humans, that has become second nature in modernity and is intricately tied to our othering of nature.
“And so, the way we're letting the planet, in many ways go to hell is very much linked to this same kind of pattern, the same othering,” he told Sunday Morning.
The billionaire space race is a symbol of this otherness, Marquardt says.
“If you think of the space race, nature is going to hell, but that's okay because we're not nature. And we're going to Mars- this misguided view is at the heart of most of our predicaments.”
He acknowledges the pressures which come with sudden movements of people but says migration is closely intertwined with other thorny global problems.
“The idea that we have migration on the one hand, and then climate change on another, and then inequality on another, and then oppression on the other, and then people living with $5 a day or less - not just a few people, but half of humanity - the idea that these things are not linked is insane.”
Marquardt knows all about the nomadic life. His own recent journey is of recovery from addiction and disillusionment with “global schmoozing” at places like the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland.
He now has a somewhat jaundiced view of the Davos set.
“I remember being at the World Economic Forum surrounded by very, very wealthy people and they all loved talking about themselves as nomads, because they had a loft in Soho, a chalet in Gstaad and a bungalow in Bali.
“Whereas I often met blank stares, when I spoke of the [book] title with people of lesser means.”
He sees parallels between Davos and his own addictions.
“At some point in Davos, when I was doing a lot of drugs, it became really obvious that this was not good for me, I knew that.
“What I found is what we've become as a civilization is addicted to extraction, to carbon, to growth, the idea that the richest people in the world, that their opinion, that their, advice is relevant to our recovery is a bit as if we were asking the people with the best heroin on the block to lead the intervention that our alcoholic or heroin addict of an uncle requires, it makes no sense.”
Poor people and poor countries contribute very little to the climate crisis, he says.
“The single most accurate measure of a company, or a country, or a person, or a household’s carbon footprint is how much money they spend. Everything else is noise.”
His interest in migration stems from his own background. He says.
“I'm the product of a long line of migrants.”
Marquardt's father is German but from a city now in Western Poland, his mother is of Greek, Hungarian, Polish and German descent, but she was born and raised in the Bronx, New York City.
“They moved to Paris in the ‘70s, which is where I was born and raised. And I didn't feel very comfortable, I was quite privileged, growing up in Paris, so we were luxury immigrants, right? We didn't have to deal with the racism of brown-skinned immigrants and in many ways, we had it really good.
“But I still didn't really fit in with French bourgeois society. And so, my answer to that as a kid was to basically double down - if you're going to treat me like a foreigner, if you're going to ‘other’ me, well I'm going to other myself.”
This led to him “hanging out with anyone who had dark skin,” he says.
“And eventually this led me to convert to Islam. Eventually, it led me to get really involved in hip hop culture and to start a French rap label.
“And it's a guiding element of my identity, this desire to go to places where I'm not expected. It's so happened that in recovery, I eventually found that without some kind of faith in a power greater than myself, my chances of staying sober and clean were very limited.
“And so, I began to develop a faith, and now I actually consider it the most important thing in my life.”
The wealthy world is, and always was, a magnet for people aiming to improve their situation, he says.
“Trying to say we're doing fine over here and well we can't really afford to have you guys come over. That's not tenable.
“It's just not going to be tenable, especially not as climate breakdown makes swathes of the world increasingly uninhabitable for humans.”
There are people drawn to wander and those who prefer to stay put and neither is better than the other, he says.
“I'm not telling people that the future is to leave our sedentary surroundings, and all go and hit the road, it's more of an embrace of nomadic metaphysics that I'm talking about.
“And what I mean by that is we can't afford to go on othering each other.”
