Dilemmas of Multiculturalism: An Introduction

I was born here . . . How many generations does it take to stop mentioning my origin?- Nadir DendotuneMost contemporary societies are ethnically and culturally diverse. Responding to diversity is a challenge! - for the United States, a "nation of immigrants," for post-colonial states of the global south, cobbled together from diverse ethnic groups, and for European nations experiencing mass immigration. Contributors to the current issue address pressing questions about cultural diversity and the dilemmas it poses.1. Multiculturalism and Cultural DiversityRoy Brooks compares three different models for dealing with cultural diversity: cultural assimilation, "transculturalism" or cosmopolitanism, and "pluralism" or multiculturalism as it is commonly understood. Each of these programs represents an answer to what he holds is the most important question concerning cultural diversity: whose values or perspectives should govern mainstream society when the values or perspectives of diverse groups clash?Cultural assimilation is the classic American doctrine of the "melting pot." On this account, Brooks notes, cultural integration is a one-way process, going from majority to minority group. When it comes to socially significant institutions, cultural assimilationists insist that white middleclass folkways should prevail. This, he suggests, confronts members of minority groups with a dilemma: cultural assimilation, and the material benefits that go along with it, come at the cost of cultural subordination.Cosmopolitanism, or "transculturalism," represents an assimilationist alternative according to which the aim is not cultural hegemony for the dominant group but cultural convergence, with each social group contributing something of value to the new, blended mainstream culture. But cosmopolitanism, Brooks notes, poses a similar dilemma since, on the cosmopolitan model, there is only one, albeit transculturalist, mainstream, which members of some minority groups might find it difficult to embrace.Unlike either of these assimilationist options, the third alternative Brooks considers, multiculturalism or "pluralism," holds that there is no one mainstream or cultural canon but rather many mainstreams and cultural canons. Nevertheless, Brooks notes, pluralism is also problematic: to the extent that it preserves cultural identity it threatens cultural balkanization.None of these alternatives is entirely satisfactory because there is no arrangement that will satisfy everyone. While, as Brooks suggests, maintaining distinct cultural identities is important to many Americans, others regard minority identities as inherently oppressive: "[W]hiteness is the marker of racial invisibility in America," writes Gary Kamiya, who describes himself as "Eurasian, or half- Japanese."White, in other words, means no race, not the master race .... This is, in fact, how most white people in America - unless they subscribe to some virulent form of identity politics, whether on the Ku Klux Klan right or the I-am-a-member-of-the-oppressors left - see themselves. White people don't go around feeling "white" unless they are either racists or have just come out of a corporate diversity consciousness-raising session . . .Having no racial self-identification is a Utopian state because it allows you to escape this malignant mirror. (Kamiya, 2007)In spite of attacks from the right and increasing critical scrutiny by the left, multiculturalism - Brooks's "pluralism" - is still heavily promoted in the U.S. Prima facie it seems to be the view that liberals, who value liberty, should adopt since it frees individuals to maintain their cultural distinctness. Nevertheless, the liberty of one person may impose restrictions on another and satisfying the preferences of multiculturalists may set back the interests of assimilationists who, like Kamiya, prefer not to think of themselves in racial terms at all - particularly members of visible minorities who cannot opt out. …