What is Multiculturalism?
Multiculturalism is both a fact and a policy. As a fact, it describes societies that contain many cultures, languages and faiths. As a policy, it holds that the state should recognise these differences and treat them fairly, instead of expecting minorities to give up their ways. Supporters believe that equal citizenship sometimes needs special measures, such as language services, religious accommodation or minority education rights. Opponents worry that this weakens shared identity. The debate is about how much a country should expect newcomers and minorities to adapt, and how much the country itself should change.
Core beliefs
- People's cultural identities matter to their dignity and wellbeing.
- Minorities should have equal respect and equal rights in public life.
- The state should not impose a single culture as the only legitimate one.
- Diversity can enrich a country's arts, food, ideas and economy.
- Fair treatment can require accommodating differences, not just treating everyone identically.
- Citizens can hold several loyalties at once, such as to a country and a heritage.
History
Writers in the early twentieth century, such as Horace Kallen in 1915, promoted cultural pluralism as an alternative to the American melting pot. Canada adopted an official multiculturalism policy in 1971 under Pierre Trudeau, and wrote it into law in 1988. Australia, Sweden and the Netherlands adopted similar approaches in the 1970s and 1980s. In the 1990s, philosophers including Charles Taylor and Will Kymlicka built the theory of group recognition and minority rights. Iris Marion Young wrote on justice and difference. From the early 2000s, concern about segregation and extremism led several European governments to say that multiculturalism had failed, and many shifted toward integration policies.
Variants
Policies range widely. A strong form funds minority institutions, such as schools and media, and gives groups legal exemptions or self-government. A weaker form simply celebrates diversity and bans discrimination. Immigrant multiculturalism deals with newcomers, while another strand deals with national minorities and Indigenous peoples who have been on the land for centuries. Liberal multiculturalists insist that groups must respect individual rights, and Susan Moller Okin warned that some group rights could harm women inside those groups. Critical multiculturalism focuses on power and inequality.
Criticisms
Critics say multiculturalism encourages separate communities that rarely mix, and that it can weaken the common culture and trust that make welfare states work. Some argue that it shelters practices that harm women, children or dissenters within a group. Others, from the left, say that focusing on culture hides class inequality. Another objection is that it treats cultures as fixed blocks, when people within a group differ and change. Supporters reply that studies show integration happens best when people feel respected, and that all states already favour some culture, so neutrality is not possible.
In practice
Canada, Australia and a number of other countries have official policies of multiculturalism, and many cities run in a multicultural way in practice. Others favour a single civic identity, as in France. On the 12 axes it scores at the extreme toward Multicultural on Culture and clearly toward Cooperation on Foreign policy, Democratic on Authority and Progressive on Morality. It scores near the middle on Technology.