For example, many Quebecois want to be able to have their own government institutions, run in the way they wish, like schools run in French.
Often, the Amish want to be left alone, without intervention from the state in their internal affairs. More precisely, one of the demands of some Amish communities is that they are exempt from the basic educational requirements that other citizens of the USA have to abide by, namely, the minimum literacy requirements. This, as will be explained later on, relates to other set of normative questions about what groups can and cannot impose to their members.
In order to address this problem, Kymlicka draws a distinction between practices that can be imposed external protections and practices that cannot be imposed internal restrictions. Under the concept of liberal national minorities are examples like Quebecois and Catalonians; these national minorities usually demand the right to use a different language in schools and their other institutions, and this does not necessarily violate any liberal value.
The concept of illiberal national minorities refers to groups that wish to endorse illiberal values, like the death penalty for gays and lesbians. Rational choice is a theory that aims to explain and predict social behavior.
From the viewpoint of rational choice, individuals act self-interestedly when they take into consideration their preferences and the information available. Self-interest means that individuals tend to maximize what is valuable for them. In other words, human behavior is goal-oriented. It is goal oriented by its preferences, that is , individuals act according to their preferences.
For instance, if an individual prefers a hot chocolate to a vanilla milkshake or a strawberry milkshake and all the options are available, he will choose hot chocolate other things being equal. According to the rational choice view, the information available strongly affects behavior. By way of illustration, if an individual does not know that hot chocolate is available he will not choose it. Thus individuals act according to their self-interest, information and preferences. Obviously, these actions are limited by the options available and by the actions of others.
Therefore, if there is no hot chocolate on the market, this person will not be able to buy it—the option is not available because the suppliers decided not to offer hot chocolate. With these premises in mind, a possible definition of culture from a rational choice perspective is provided by Laitin , p.
Therefore, there are four key features of this conception of culture. First, a cultural group is a group in which individuals share a certain number of characteristics that differentiate them from other individuals—for example, language or religion.
Second, all these individuals share a high degree of common knowledge. What common knowledge means in this context is that the members of a certain culture have shared information and mutual expectations about the actions and beliefs of others in the group. Third, there is a cultural equilibrium when the incentive to act or the self-interest to act is according to the beliefs of his or her own culture. These norms and practices can be any, but Laitin provides an insightful example with respect to the old Chinese tradition of foot binding.
Laitin explains that it was very difficult for Chinese women to marry a man if they did not engage in the foot binding tradition. In this case, most Chinese parents forced their daughters to engage in this practice owing to the fact that their interest in finding a husband to their daughters was in accordance with the cultural practice of foot binding.
Finally, a well-defined set of circumstances can be described as a kind of situation where the type of interactions that members have with each other are ones of coordination and not conflict. The concepts of culture mentioned above have been strongly criticized by some political theorists. Some of these, who direct their criticisms mostly to the semiotic, normative and societal conceptions of culture, argue that these conceptions are essentialist views of culture that inaccurately describe social reality.
However, as Festenstein has pointed out, these criticisms are sometimes misplaced, that is, these conceptions of culture do not necessarily need to be essentialist. In general terms, from an essentialist point of view, there is a distinction between the essential and accidental properties that the different kinds of objects and subjects may have. Accidental properties are properties that are not necessarily present in all members of a certain group of objects or subjects.
Essential properties are those that define the objects or subjects, that is, objects or subjects necessarily need to have these properties in order to be members of a certain group. Furthermore, members of other groups do not have this property or set of properties; otherwise they too would belong to this group. By way of illustration, a bookshelf in order to be a bookshelf has to necessarily be constructed in a way that makes it possible to hold books—this is its essential property.
The fact that a specific bookshelf is brown, black or blue is an accidental property—it does not change what the object is and it is indifferent to its definition. These properties are necessary and sufficient not only to include a certain object or subject in the group but also to exclude any object or subject which does not share these properties. Bearing this in mind, it can be concluded that essences are given by differences and similarities; for what defines a subject is what it has in common with the subjects of the same group, which in turn is a characteristic that other groups do not have.
In terms of what this means to culture, it means identifying the social characteristics or attributes that make the group what it is, and that all members of that group necessarily share. Moreover, these characteristics are what differentiate members of that group from others and clearly exclude others Young, a, p. For example, for an essentialist, to classify Muslims as Muslims means to identify a certain characteristic, like shared practices and beliefs, common to all of the individuals who identify as Muslims.
Thus, essentialism applied to culture would be that a certain culture means having a certain characteristic or set of characteristics that all members share, and which no one outside the group does. Hence, from this point of view, the identity of the group is constituted by the set of properties or attributes which are essential to this particular group Young, a. According to the critics of essentialism, this theory necessarily makes two wrong assumptions about culture.
First, the critics state that essentialists wrongly affirm that cultures are clearly demarcated wholes and their practices and beliefs do not overlap with other cultures. Thus, according to this argument, essentialists wrongly affirm that beliefs and practices are exclusive to each culture. This premise is necessary for defending essentialism because from an essentialist point of view; different groups cannot share the same essential properties; otherwise they would belong to the same group.
Second, essentialists, according to these critics, wrongly picture cultures as internally uniform or homogeneous. Put differently, essentialists consider that individuals with the same culture all agree and interpret practices in the same way.
Furthermore, they all place the same value on the practices of the group. This second premise is necessary for essentialist thinking owing to the fact that a group has to have a property or a set of properties that is predicated of all individuals in order for them to be members of this group.
This essentialist perspective of culture has however been widely contested. The general argument is that essentialism stereotypes and makes abusive generalizations of what groups are. That is to say, according to the critics, essentialism is descriptively inaccurate. Criticism of this perspective contends that the first premise lacks empirical evidence. There is no evidence that there is any exclusivity in terms of practices and beliefs, in fact, evidence suggests the opposite; cultures borrow practices and beliefs in order to increase their fitness.
Cultures are not bounded, owing to the fact that culture is constantly changing, influenced by local, national and global resources Phillips, a; Hence, according to this view, it is not possible to clearly demarcate the boundaries of cultures because they share a number of practices and beliefs. There is significant overlapping of cultures, especially in neighboring cultures. The distinction between cultures is, therefore, overemphasized—the boundaries between cultures not being clearly demarcated Benhabib, ; Phillips, a.
With regards to the second premise, the criticism contends that it is false to say that there is internal homogeneity inside a group in terms of needs, interests and beliefs. Rather, the social actors of cultural groups have different needs, interests and interpretations about the beliefs and practices of groups.
Furthermore, in many cases, they consider these practices and beliefs quite contestable, discussable and open to different interpretations. Therefore, there is wide disagreement about cultural meaning Benhabib, Anti-essentialists contend that there are too many exceptions to make essentialist claims. Therefore, there are a considerable number of counter-examples to this generalization Phillips, a; ; Schachar, a. As a consequence, some anti-essentialists usually argue that these categories should be substituted by thinner categories.
Thus, rather than speaking about women, one should speak about black women, or lesbian Muslim women. Taking this into consideration, different, more flexible conceptions of culture have been suggested; perhaps the most well-known being the cosmopolitan conception of culture, defended by Waldron. Consequently, cultures overlap with each other, making it impossible to attribute exclusive properties to one single culture and to differentiate between them.
Hence, individuals live in a kaleidoscope of cultures, within which they enjoy and borrow practices Waldron, A question that arises is whether this criticism entails that any attempt to define culture is mistaken. Some anti-essentialists like Narayan contend that this is not the case.
Rather, she contends that cultures can be defined if two points are taken into consideration. First, cultures are fluid and constantly changing; hence, any definition of culture should consider that cultures are always in flux. Second, broader categories should be substituted by thinner categories. In general terms, within contemporary political philosophy, the concept of multiculturalism has been defined in two different ways.
Many countries in the world are culturally diverse. Canada is just one example, including a variety of cultures such as English Canadians, Quebecois, Native Americans, Amish, Hutterites and Chinese immigrants. China is another country that can also be considered culturally diverse. In contemporary China, there are 56 officially recognized ethnic groups, and 55 of these groups are ethnic minorities who make up approximately 8.
The other ethnic group is that of Han Chinese, which holds majority status Han, ; He, There are a variety of ways whereby societies can be diverse, for example, culture can come in many forms Gurr, , p. Perhaps the chief ways in which a country can be culturally diverse is by having different religious groups, different linguistic groups, groups that define themselves by their territorial identity and variant racial groups.
Religious diversity is a widespread phenomenon in many countries. India can be given as an example of a country which is religiously diverse, including citizens who are Sikhs, Hindus, Buddhists, among other religious groups.
These groups differentiate from each other via a variety of factors. Some of these are the Gods worshiped, the public holidays, the religious festivals and the dress codes. Linguistic diversity is also widespread. In the 21 st century, there are more than countries in the world and around spoken languages Laitin, Linguistic diversity usually results from two kinds of groups. First, it results from immigrants who move to a country where the language spoken is not their native language Kymlicka, This is the case for those Cubans and Puerto Ricans who immigrated to the United States; it is also the case for Ukrainian immigrants who moved to Portugal.
The second set of groups that are understood as a form of linguistic diversity are national minorities. Usually, these linguistic groups are territorially concentrated; furthermore, minority groups that fall into this category usually demand a high degree of autonomy.
In particular, minority groups usually demand that they have the regional power to self-govern, that is, to run their territory as if it was an independent country or to succeed and become a different country. A third kind of group diversity can results from distinct territory location. This territory location does not necessary mean that members of distinct cultures are, in fact, different.
That is, it is not necessary that habits, traditions, customs, and so forth are significantly different. However, these distinct groups identify themselves as different from others because of the specific geographical area in which they are located. Possibly, in the UK, this is what distinguishes Scots from English. Even though there are historical differences between Scots and English, if one assumes that these two groups have little to distinguish themselves from each other, other than their geographical location, they would fit this third kind of group diversity.
As mentioned above, these differences are conceptual and, in practice, cultural groups are characterized by a variety of features and not just one. The fourth kind of group diversity is race.
Races are groups whose physical characteristics are imbued with social significance. For instance, it cannot be affirmed that Sweden is multicultural because there are Swedes with blue eyes and others with green. Physical characteristics create a multicultural environment only when these physical characteristics mean that groups strongly identify with their physical characteristics and where these physical characteristics are socially perceived as something that strongly differentiates them from other groups.
That is, racial cultural diversity is not simply the existence of different physical characteristics. Rather, these different physical characteristics must entail a sense of common identity which, in turn, are socially perceived as something that differentiates the members of that group to others.
For instance, even though there is the idea that a black culture exists in the United States, Appiah denies that such black culture exists, since there is no common identity among blacks in the United States. In general terms, Tutsis and Hutus are very similar, due to the fact that they speak the same language, share the same territory and follow the same traditions.
Nevertheless, Tutsis are usually taller and thinner than Hutus. The social significance given to these physical differences are sufficient for members of both groups, broadly speaking, to identify as members of one group or the other, and subsequently oppose to each other.
Obviously, groups are not, most of the time, identified only by being linguistically different, territorially concentrated or religiously distinct. In fact, most groups have more than one of these characteristics. For instance, Sikhs in India, besides being religiously different, are also characterized, in general terms, by their geographical location.
Namely, they are localized in the Punjab region of India. The Uyghur, from China, have a different language, are usually Muslims and are usually located in Xinjiang. Thus, the classification is helpful for understanding the characteristics of each group, but does not mean that these groups are simply defined by that characteristic.
This kind of policy has two main characteristics. First, it aims at addressing the different demands of cultural groups. That is, it is a kind of policy that refers to the different normative challenges ethnic conflict, internal illiberalism, federal autonomy, and so forth that arise as a result of cultural diversity. For example, these are policies that aim at addressing the different normative challenges that arise from minority groups, like Quebecois, wishing to have their own institutions in a different language from the rest of Canada.
To contrast with redistributive policies, multicultural policies are not primarily about distributive justice, that is, who gets what share of resources, although multicultural policies may refer to redistribution accidentally Fraser, For instance, these are policies that aim at correcting a disadvantage that may result from someone being a member of a certain religion.
In the case of some Muslims, this can mean addressing the problem of Muslims living in a Christian country and demanding different public holidays than the majority to celebrate their own festivals such as Eid-al-Fitr. Second, multicultural policies are policies that aim at providing groups the means by which individuals can pursue their cultural differences.
Put differently, multicultural policies have as their objectives, the preservation, allowance or celebration of differences between different groups. Consequently, multicultural policies contrast with assimilation.
That is, according to the assimilationist view, it is acceptable that people are different, but the final goal of policies should be to make the minority group become part of the majority group, that is, to be accepted by those in the majority group, and to somehow find a consensus position between different cultures.
Contrastingly, multiculturalism acknowledges that people have different ways of life and, in general terms, the state ought not to assimilate these groups but to give them the tools for pursuing their own ways of life or culture. That is, from a multiculturalist point of view, the final objective of policies is neither the standardization of cultural forms nor any form of uniformity or homogeneity; rather, its objective is to allow and give the means for groups to pursue their differences.
According to Kymlicka, in the context of contemporary liberal political philosophy, there have been two waves of writings on multiculturalism Kymlicka, a. This discussion of what policies ought to be undertaken in order to protect minority cultures is included in what Kymlicka called the first wave of the wave of writings on multiculturalism. In his view a, p. In this first wave of writings, contemporary liberal political philosophers have discussed what kind of inequalities exist between majorities and minorities, and how these should be addressed.
In other words, the discussion has been about what kind of intergroup inequalities exist, and what the state should do about them. In general terms, contemporary liberal political philosophers who have written about this topic have taken two different stands. On the one hand, some liberal political philosophers defend that state institutions should be blind to difference and that individuals should be given a uniform set of rights and liberties.
Therefore, those who stand for a uniform set of rights and liberties contend that ascribing rights on the basis of membership in a group is a discriminatory and immoral policy that creates citizenship hierarchies that are undesirable and unjust Kymlicka, a, pp. Thus, in the view of these contemporary liberal philosophers, involvement in the cultural character of society is something that the state is under the duty to not do.
On the other hand, some philosophers have taken the opposite view on this matter. For example, there are some contemporary liberal political philosophers who are more sympathetic to the idea of ascribing rights to groups and have defended difference-sensitive policies.
As Kymlicka a, p. In general terms, these contemporary political philosophers argue that a regime of difference-sensitive policies does not necessarily entail a hierarchization of citizenship and unfair privileges for some groups. Rather, they argue that difference-sensitive policies aim at correcting intergroup inequalities and disadvantages in the cultural market. Moreover, some of these philosophers contend that difference-blind policies favor the needs, interests and identities of the majority Kymlicka, a, pp.
These philosophers who consider that groups are entitled to special rights can be classified as a form of multicultural citizenship. Those who defend special rights for groups have suggested a variety of policies. In his book The Multiculturalism of Fear, Levy , pp. Exemptions to laws are usually rights based on a negative liberty of non-interference from the state in a specific affair, which would cause a significant burden to a certain group.
Or, to put it another way, exemptions to the law happen when the state abstains from interfering with or obliging a certain group who desire to practice something in order to diminish their burden.
Imagine that there is a general law that decrees corporations have the right to impose a dress code upon their employees.
However, having this general law would burden those groups for whom dressing in a certain manner that is, different from the one required by the company is a very important value. For example, for many Sikh men and Muslim women it is very important to wear turbans and headscarves, respectively. Hence, it can be claimed that giving these individuals the option of either finding another job or rejecting their dress code can be a significant burden to them; given that the choice of dressing in a certain way is sometimes much harder for Sikh men and Muslim women than for a Westerner, and that it would undermine their identity, an exemption may be justified Levy, , pp.
Hence, these groups would be able to engage in practices that are not allowable for the majority of citizens. Assistance rights aim to aid individuals in overcoming the obstacles they face because they belong to a certain group. In other words, assistance rights aim to rectify disadvantages experienced by certain individuals, as a result of their membership of a certain group, when compared to the majority.
This can mean funding individuals to pursue their goals or using positive discrimination to help them in a variety of ways. Language rights are an example of this approach. Suppose that some individuals from Catalonia cannot speak Spanish. An assistance measure would be having people speak both Spanish and Catalan at public institutions, so that they can serve people from the minority as well the minority language group.
Another example would be awarding subsidies to help groups preserve their cohesion by maintaining their practices and beliefs, and by allowing individuals from a minority to participate in public institutions as full citizens. Most of these practices are temporary, but they do not need to be language rights, for example, are often not temporary Levy, , pp. In a multicultural country, where there are multiple religions, ethnicities and ways of life, it may not make sense to have certain symbols that represent only a specific culture.
Not integrating minority symbols may be considered as dispensing a lack of respect and unequal treatment to minorities. Recognition is a demand for integrating a specific law or cultural practice into the larger society. If individuals want to integrate a specific law, they can ask for the law to become part of the major legal system. Hence, Sharia law could form part of divorce law for Muslims, while Aboriginal law could run in conjunction with Australian property rights law.
It could also be a requirement to include certain groups in the history books used in schools—for example, to include the history of Indian and Pakistani immigrants in British history textbooks. In the Muslim case, because family law is of crucial importance to their identity, they may be considerably burdened by having to abide by a Western perspective of divorce. With regards to Aboriginal law, because hunting is essential for their way of life, if other individuals own the ir land this may undermine the Aboriginal culture.
Special representation rights are designed to protect groups which have been systematically unrepresented and disadvantaged in the larger society. Minority groups may be under-represented in the institutions of a society, and in order to place them in a position of equal bargaining power, it is necessary to provide special rights to the members of these groups.
One way to achieve this is by setting aside extra seats for minorities in parliament Kymlicka, , pp. Self-government rights are usually what are claimed by national minorities for example, Pueblo Indians and Quebecois and they usually demand some degree of autonomy and self-determination.
This sometimes implies demands for exclusive occupation of land and territorial jurisdiction. More precisely, a specific educational curriculum, language right or jurisdiction over a territory may be a necessary requirement for the survival and prosperity of a particular culture and its members. This is compatible with both freedom and equality; it is compatible with freedom because it allows individuals access to their culture and to make their own choices; it is consistent with equality because it places individuals on an equal footing in terms of cultural access Kymlicka, , pp.
What Levy classifies as external rules can be considered as kinds of rights for self-government. Hence, Aborigines in Australia employ external safeguards to protect their land.
For example, freedom of movement is limited to outsiders who circulate in Aboriginal territory; furthermore, outsiders do not have the right to buy Aboriginal land.
Stigmatizing, ostracizing or excommunicating individuals from groups because they have not abided by the rules is what is usually meant by internal rules.
Thus, this is the power given to groups to treat their members in a way that is not acceptable for the rest of society. An example can be if a certain individual marries someone from another group, which may then mean he is expelled from his own group.
Another case is that of the Amish who want their children to withdraw from school earlier than the rest of society. In contrast to external rules, the restrictions on freedom apply to members of the group and not to outsiders. It is controversial whether internal rules are compatible with liberal values or not.
On the other hand, philosophers like Kukathas contend that liberals are committed to tolerance and, thereby, should accept some internal restrictions. Generally speaking, the philosophy of those authors who defend a multicultural citizenship, have five points in common.
Firstly, they all contend that the state has the duty to support laws which defend the basic legal, civil and political rights of its citizens. Secondly, they argue that the state should participate in the construction of societal cultural character, thus its laws and policies should aim to protect culture. Thirdly, these philosophers contend that the character of culture is normative.
Some of the philosophers who defend a multicultural citizenship are Taylor, Kymlicka and Shachar. According to Taylor, there are two forms of recognition; intimate recognition and public recognition. Taylor b, p. Bearing this in mind, recognition is a vital human need because the relation between recognition and identity the way people understand who they are is relatively strong; hence, misrecognition or non-recognition may have a serious harmful effect on individuals.
In order to discuss the best way to achieve recognition in the public realm, Taylor draws a distinction between procedural and non-procedural forms of liberalism. He affirms that, according to the procedural version of liberalism, a just society is one where all individuals have a uniform set of rights and freedoms, and having different rights for different people creates distinctions between first-class and second-class citizens: this liberalism is only committed to individual rights and rejects the idea of collective rights.
The state, according to this version of liberalism, should not be involved in the cultural character of society and the procedures of this society must be independent of any particular set of values held by the citizens of that polity. In other words, the state should be neutral and independent of any conception of the good life. Taylor believes that, in some cases, collective goals need to be aided so that they can be achieved.
Sometimes cultural communities need to have power over certain jurisdictions so that they can promote their own culture; this is something that a procedural liberalism does not offer, according to Taylor. According to Taylor, this liberalism takes into account differences between individuals and groups and by taking these into account it creates an environment that is not hostile to the flourishing of different cultures.
The language of cultures provides the framework for the question of who one is. Taylor specifically mentions the rights to life, liberty, due process, free speech and free practice of religion.
It means that there should be decentralized power so that communities can flourish. However, what this decentralization and non-procedural liberalism imply in practice depends on the context; in different countries with different kinds of minorities there may be different implications. Taylor mostly writes about the Canadian context and he believes that in this context the best policy is a form of federalism.
In his view, Quebec should be given self-government rights so that it has power over a certain number of policies. In particular, Taylor affirms that it should have sovereign power over art, technology, economy, labor, communications, agriculture, and fisheries. In the case of language policies, Taylor contends that in some cases it is justified to violate liberal values, like freedom of expression, in order to protect the language of a community. For instance, in the case of Quebec, communications in English can be restricted by the state in order to promote the French language.
Another example is that offspring of French parents do not have the option of choosing a language of instruction that is not French. Moreover, it should have shared power with the majority in immigration, industrial policy and environmental policy. Control over defense, external affairs and currency is given to the federal government. Federalism is not at the core of the recognition idea; rather, federalism is a kind of system that Taylor considers is the adequate option in the Canadian context, which does not mean it is a good option in all contexts.
But, he says, multiculturalism's message is "there is no need to integrate". He distinguishes between tolerance and multiculturalism - using the Netherlands as an example of a tolerant, rather than multicultural, society.
Additionally, he says the current meaning of multiculturalism is part of the wider European phenomenon of moral relativism and talks of multiculturalism as dissolving national identity, shared values and collective identity which "makes it impossible for groups to integrate because there is nothing to integrate into". Others, however, see the term as offering a range of meanings. In the Observer, the editor of Prospect magazine, David Goodhart, insists the strategy has taken on different forms within the UK over the years.
He distinguishes between the "live and let live" multiculturalism of the s, which "assumed that if people could keep significant aspects of their culture they would choose to integrate in their own way"; the s "'soft' multiculturalism of tolerance and equal rights"; and the more recent "hard" multiculturalism "of positive promotion of religious and ethnic identities". Rod Liddle says in the Spectator that multiculturalism is a notion that cultures, no matter how antithetical to the norm, or anti-social, should be allowed to develop unhindered, without criticism.
Melanie Phillips takes this argument further in the Daily Mail, arguing that multiculturalism is a form of reverse-racism and "sickeningly hypocritical". However, Madeleine Bunting of the Guardian says Mr Cameron has offered "a straw man version of multiculturalism".
Instead of promoting segregation, she says, it is "a matter of pragmatism" - reaching out to organisations within ethnic communities who can help the government achieve its goals of maintaining good community relations.
Matched Categories Doctrine. How to pronounce multiculturalism? Alex US English. David US English. Mark US English. Daniel British. Libby British. Mia British. Karen Australian. Hayley Australian. Natasha Australian. Veena Indian. Priya Indian. Neerja Indian. Zira US English. Oliver British. Wendy British. Fred US English. Tessa South African. How to say multiculturalism in sign language? Numerology Chaldean Numerology The numerical value of multiculturalism in Chaldean Numerology is: 9 Pythagorean Numerology The numerical value of multiculturalism in Pythagorean Numerology is: 8.
Examples of multiculturalism in a Sentence Musin Almat Zhumabekovich : The evolutionary, gene transformation of the chimera of thinking, due to the gene of ingenuity and egoism, expands, as it were, the universe of dissociation.
Eugen Peuke : It multiculturalism doesn't work. President Putin : There is also the so-called liberal idea, which has outlived its purpose, our Western partners have admitted that some elements of the liberal idea, such as multiculturalism , are no longer tenable. Anetta Kahane : It is against liberalism, against globalised society, against science, against intellectuals, against multiculturalism and all the [trappings of] modern society.
Musin Almat Zhumabekovich : The evolutionary, gene transformation of the chimera of thinking, due to the gene of ingenuity and egoism, expands, as it were, the universe of disunity.
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