In its new report, No Way In or Out: Authoritarian Controls on the Freedom of Movement, Freedom House highlights that authoritarian states are increasingly using mobility restrictions as a tool of repression. Immigration restrictions enacted by liberal democracies contribute to this problem; authoritarian regimes are not the only ones enacting unjust mobility restrictions. Here is a summary of the findings of Freedom House’s report:

• At least 55 governments around the world restrict freedom of movement to punish, coerce or control people they consider threats or political opponents.

• The four main tactics used to control mobility are revocation of citizenship, document control, denial of consular services and travel bans.

• Restrictions on freedom of movement can be a less visible form of authoritarian control. They are often imposed informally or arbitrarily, leaving those affected with no means of effectively resisting them. Restrictions are also often combined with other forms of repression, including asset confiscations, smear campaigns and false criminal charges.

• The impact of compulsory mobility controls is severe and far-reaching – they can lead to loss of residency status, separation from family, inability to access educational or professional opportunities, and psychological distress. They undermine people’s ability to express dissent and stand up for democracy, and send a signal to potential government critics that they will face similar consequences.

• Democratic governments should seek to hold those who use these tactics to account and review their own migration policies to ensure that they do not contribute further to the suffering of people forcibly restricted in their freedom of movement.

The report makes a number of recommendations, including that democratic “governments should review their migration and asylum policies to ensure that they do not contribute to the hardships faced by people facing forced mobility restrictions. This includes that people who cannot produce a valid national passport due to mobility restrictions should not be penalized with fines, barriers to education or health care, or restrictions on newborn registration or marriage.”

I support these ideas. But they are just the tip of a much larger iceberg of actions by liberal democratic governments that ultimately reinforce authoritarian oppression. Most importantly, migration restrictions exclude many people fleeing authoritarian oppression. The right to leave an authoritarian state is worth little if it is not coupled with the right to enter a freer society.

Most democracies have laws granting asylum to people who are considered “refugees.” Yet the legal definition of “refugee” in international and U.S. law is very narrow and excludes many people fleeing horrific violence and oppression. It includes only people whose “life or freedom would be threatened because of their race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion.” This effectively excludes many who are fleeing what I have called the “equal opportunity” for oppression and violence afforded to everyone living under the rule of an oppressive government, not just to members of certain social groups.

Even many people who meet the legal definition of a “refugee” are often deported under rules like the Biden administration’s new asylum policy, which bars most migrants who cross the border from attempting to seek asylum, including many who may have good legal arguments. Many Republicans favor even stricter asylum and migration restrictions. They want to close legal immigration pathways to people fleeing brutal repression, including by socialist regimes that conservatives rightly condemn, like those in Cuba and Venezuela. Opening the West’s doors to migrants fleeing repression is both the right thing to do and a good way to stimulate our economies and reduce budget deficits.

Liberal democracies’ restrictions on mobility are generally not as bad as those of authoritarian states. But our governments are not as superior to theirs as they should be, and there is plenty of room for improvement. We can start by broadening the definition of “refugee” to include all people fleeing oppression and violence, and ending other arbitrary restrictions on the right to asylum. Giving asylum seekers the right to work legally would also help.