“Gradually, then suddenly” is how Hemingway famously found himself bankrupt. This same process is now playing out on the issue of immigration in the West. For years, problems brought on by each country’s high-migration model were either explained away, ignored or excused by governments. Crime was only committed by a tiny minority. Cultural differences were a good thing, actually. Rapidly changing demographics were either not happening, not worth noticing, worth celebrating, or xenophobic to point out. The list goes on.

Now, the problems and contradictions of immigration are coming in too thick and fast for governments to handle. Australia simultaneously has visa protests, “Free Palestine” protests, an ongoing political battle over Gazan fast-tracked visas, an immigration-induced housing crisis, a rental crisis, growing homelessness, and a GDP per capita recession, to name just a few of the problems. Immigration, to be sure, isn’t the only factor in all these, but it is the consistent one. 

To paraphrase Christopher Caldwell, these problems may not be singularly caused by mass immigration, but they are the type of problem that mass immigration makes worse. Across the West, each country has its own unique set of immigration problems: Britain has a social housing problem and encroaching political sectarianism. Canada has a housing crisis, and growing cultural tensions. The USA has illegal immigration, and crime problems. France has organised crime, Germany has street crime. The list goes on. These are generalisations to be sure, but the problems are obvious and shouldn’t be ignored.

Politically, the Western world is splitting into two factions: the mass-migrationists, and the low/no-migrationists 

The subsequent political reaction was seen as inevitable to anybody who saw the problems emerging, saw them unfolding, and then saw the governments do nothing about them. The cause and effect couldn’t have been simpler. National Rally in France grew its vote share and bolstered its electoral funding coffers, AfD saw a standout result in regional elections, the Reform Party gained 5 seats in Parliament and is polling strongly, Trump as of writing has a serious chance of getting reelected. 

Politically, the Western world is splitting into two factions: the mass-migrationists, and the low/no-migrationists. On the pro side, the argument has consistently been that, despite any minor issues that may appear, immigration is broadly a net-benefit. But this position is increasingly hard to defend, namely because living standards have continued to worsen at the exact rate that immigration levels have gotten higher. The argument from the mass-migrationists is now morphing from; “it’s good for us” to “we need it”, to “if we don’t have it we collapse” — which is either a worrying acceleration, or a cynical change of position. 

Then there’s the immigration-sceptic side. To an average-income worker, finding a reason to get angry over immigration is easy. Simply pick something that’s gotten worse in your life in the last twenty years, and there’s likely a political or economic reason that has an immigration link. Community collapse? Demographic change. Stagnant wages? Tighter wage competition. Inflation? Rental demand. Rightly or wrongly, people everywhere are starting to connect the problems in their lives to immigration. Governments used to be able to keep a lid on such immigration dissent, aided by a supportive media and managerial class, but the ascendancy of freer social media discourse thanks to the likes of Elon Musk’s X, combined with a strained state capacity, means the argument for governments and pro-migrationists is harder to engage in — let alone win.

Knowing that the wind is shifting against them, the mass-migrationists are now instead looking towards stifling, stopping and outright outlawing debate. Just this month, Robert Reich in the Guardian called for the arrest of Elon Musk, while pro-migrationist professor Alan Gamlen from the Australian National University called for the establishment of “National Migration Institute” supported by “NGOs, philanthropists, and migrant communities” to “counteract misinformation” about immigration.

At the same time, “tech journalists” and “investigative reporters” — who are often conveniently friendly with both anti-fascist and government agencies alike — are now turning their focus away from writing about specific figures and people in anti-immigrationist movements, toward the technology that facilitates these communities: algorithms, AI, and other digital tools. This may be a sign that pro-migrationists are on the retreat.

The West became skeptical on immigration gradually, then all at once. The acceleration of immigration skepticism in the last two years has been an astounding sight to behold. The rate that the argument is changing gives observers whiplash. The significance of the success for a party like the AfD in a place like Germany is historical. Sweden, once the liberal bastion of the West, now has net-negative migration. GOP rallies now have placards calling for mass deportations. The acceleration of this issue shows no sign of slowing down, and the question now is what pro-migrationist Western governments will do: are they going to back down on high immigration, or crack down on dissent? 

An almighty political clash between both sides will soon be playing out, and it could easily go both ways. One thing is for certain, these next few years won’t be boring.