The idea of multiculturalism in contemporary political discourse andin political philosophy reflects a debate about how to understand andrespond to the challenges associated with cultural diversity based onethnic, national, and religious differences. The term“multicultural” is often used as a descriptive term tocharacterize the fact of diversity in a society, but in what follows,the focus is on multiculturalism as a normative ideal in the contextof Western liberal democratic societies. While the term has come toencompass a variety of normative claims and goals, it is fair to saythat proponents of multiculturalism find common ground in rejectingthe ideal of the “melting pot” in which members ofminority groups are expected to assimilate into the dominant culture.Instead, proponents of multiculturalism endorse an ideal in whichmembers of minority groups can maintain their distinctive collectiveidentities and practices. In the case of immigrants, proponentsemphasize that multiculturalism is compatible with, not opposed to,the integration of immigrants into society; multiculturalism policiesprovide fairer terms of integration for immigrants.

Modern states are organized around the language and culture of thedominant groups that have historically constituted them. As a result,members of minority cultural groups face barriers in pursuing theirsocial practices in ways that members of dominant groups do not. Sometheorists argue for tolerating minority groups by leaving them free ofstate interference (Kukathas 1995, 2003). Others argue that meretoleration of group differences falls short of treating members ofminority groups as equals; what is required is recognition andpositive accommodation of minority group practices through what theleading theorist of multiculturalism Will Kymlicka has called“group-differentiated rights” (1995). Somegroup-differentiated rights are held by individual members of minoritygroups, as in the case of individuals who are granted exemptions fromgenerally applicable laws in virtue of their religious beliefs orindividuals who seek language accommodations in education and invoting. Other group-differentiated rights are held by the group quagroup rather by its members severally; such rights are properly called“group rights,” as in the case of indigenous groups andminority nations, who claim the right of self-determination. In thelatter respect, multiculturalism is closely allied withnationalism.

Multiculturalism is part of a broader political movement for greaterinclusion of marginalized groups, including African Americans, women,LGBTQ people, and people with disabilities (Glazer 1997, Hollinger1995, Taylor 1992). This broader political movement is reflected inthe “multiculturalism” debates in the 1980s over whetherand how to diversify school curricula to recognize the achievements ofhistorically marginalized groups. But the more specific focus ofcontemporary theories of multiculturalism is the recognition andinclusion of minority groups defined primarily in terms of ethnicity,nationality, and religion. The main concern of contemporarymulticulturalism are immigrants who are ethnic and religiousminorities (e.g. Latinx people in the U.S., Muslims in WesternEurope), minority nations (e.g. the Basque, Catalans,Québécois, Welsh) and indigenous peoples (e.g. Nativepeoples and indigenous groups in Canada, the U.S., Australia, and NewZealand).

• 1. The claims of multiculturalism
• 2. Justifications for multiculturalism
  • 2.1 Recognition
  • 2.2 Equality
  • 2.3 Freedom from domination
  • 2.4 Addressing historical injustice
• 3. Critique of multiculturalism
  • 3.1 Cosmopolitan view of culture
  • 3.2 Toleration requires indifference, not accommodation
  • 3.3 Diversion from a “politics of redistribution”
  • 3.4 Universalist ideal of equality
  • 3.5 Postcolonial critique
  • 3.6 Feminist critique of multiculturalism
• 4. Political retreat from multiculturalism?
• Bibliography
• Academic Tools
• Other Internet Resources
• Related Entries

1. The claims of multiculturalism

Multiculturalism is closely associated with “identitypolitics,” “the politics of difference,” and“the politics of recognition,” all of which share acommitment to revaluing disrespected identities and changing dominantpatterns of representation and communication that marginalize certaingroups (Gutmann 2003, Taylor 1992, Young 1990). Multiculturalisminvolves not only claims of identity and culture as some critics ofmulticulturalism suggest. It is also a matter of economic interestsand political power: it includes demands for remedying economic andpolitical disadvantages that people suffer as a result of theirmarginalized group identities.

Multiculturalists take for granted that it is “culture”and “cultural groups” that are to be recognized andaccommodated. Yet multicultural claims include a wide range of claimsinvolving religion, language, ethnicity, nationality, and race.Culture is a contested, open-ended concept, and all of thesecategories have been subsumed by or equated with the concept ofculture. Disaggregating and distinguishing among different types ofclaims can clarify what is at stake (Song 2008). Language and religionare at the heart of many claims for cultural accommodation byimmigrants. The key claim made by minority nations is forself-government rights. Race has a more limited role in multiculturaldiscourse. Antiracism and multiculturalism are distinct but relatedideas: the former highlights “victimization andresistance” whereas the latter highlights “cultural life,cultural expression, achievements, and the like” (Blum 1992,14). Claims for recognition in the context of multicultural educationare demands not just for recognition of aspects of a group’sactual culture (e.g. African American art and literature) but also foracknowledgment of the history of group subordination and itsconcomitant experience (Gooding-Williams 1998).

Examples of cultural accommodations or “group-differentiatedrights” include exemptions from generally applicable law (e.g.religious exemptions), assistance to do things that members of themajority culture are already enabled to do (e.g. multilingual ballots,funding for minority language schools and ethnic associations,affirmative action), representation of minorities in government bodies(e.g. ethnic quotas for party lists or legislative seats,minority-majority Congressional districts), recognition of traditionallegal codes by the dominant legal system (e.g. granting jurisdictionover family law to religious courts), or limited self-governmentrights (e.g. qualified recognition of tribal sovereignty, federalarrangements recognizing the political autonomy of Québec) (fora helpful classification of cultural rights, see Levy 1997).

Typically, a group-differentiated right is a right of a minority group(or a member of such a group) to act or not act in a certain way inaccordance with their religious obligations and/or culturalcommitments. In some cases, it is a right that directly restricts thefreedom of non-members in order to protect the minority group’sculture, as in the case of restrictions on the use of the Englishlanguage in Québec. When the right-holder is the group, theright may protect group rules that restrict the freedom of individualmembers, as in the case of the Pueblo membership rule that excludesthe children of women who marry outside the group. Now that you have asense of the kinds of claims that have been made in the name ofmulticulturalism, we can now turn to consider different normativejustifications for these claims.

2. Justifications for multiculturalism

2.1 Recognition

One justification for multiculturalism arises out of the communitariancritique of liberalism. Liberals tend to be ethical individualists;they insist that individuals should be free to choose and pursue theirown conceptions of the good life. They give primacy to individualrights and liberties over community life and collective goods. Someliberals are also individualists when it comes to social ontology(what some call methodological individualism or atomism).Methodological individualists believe that you can and should accountfor social actions and social goods in terms of the properties of theconstituent individuals and individual goods. The target of thecommunitarian critique of liberalism is not so much liberal ethics asliberal social ontology. Communitarians reject the idea that theindividual is prior to the community and that the value of socialgoods can be reduced to their contribution to individual well-being.They instead embrace ontological holism, which acknowledges collectivegoods as, in Charles Taylor’s words, “irreduciblysocial”and intrinsically valuable (Taylor 1995).

An ontologically holist view of collective identities and culturesunderlies Taylor’s argument for a “politics ofrecognition.” Drawing on Rousseau, Herder, and Hegel, amongothers, Taylor argues that we do not become full human agents anddefine our identity in isolation from others; rather, “we defineour identity always in dialogue with, sometimes in struggle against,the things our significant others want to see in us” (1994, 33).Because our identities are formed dialogically, we are dependent onthe recognition of others. The absence of recognition ormis-recognition can cause serious injury: “A person or a groupof people can suffer real damage, real distortion, if the people orsociety around them mirror back to them a confining or demeaning orcontemptible picture of themselves” (25). The struggle forrecognition can only be satisfactorily resolved through “aregime of reciprocal recognition among equals” (50). Taylordistinguishes the politics of recognition from the traditional liberal“politics of equal respect” that is “inhospitable todifference, because (a) it insists on uniform application of the rulesdefining these rights, without exception, and (b) it is suspicious ofcollective goals” (60). By contrast, the politics of recognitionis grounded on “judgments about what makes a goodlife—judgments in which the integrity of cultures has animportant place” (61). He discusses the example of the survivalof French culture in Quebec. The French language is not merely acollective resource that individuals might want to make use of andthereby seek to preserve, as suggested by a politics of equal respect.Instead, the French language is an irreducibly collective good thatitself deserves to be preserved: language policies aimed at preservingthe French language in Québec “actively seek to createmembers of the community” by assuring that future generationscontinue to identify as French-speakers (58). Because of theindispensable role of cultures in the development human agency andidentity, Taylor argues, we should adopt the presumption of the equalworth of all cultures (66).

2.2 Equality

A second justification for multiculturalism comes from withinliberalism but a liberalism that has been revised through criticalengagement with the communitarian critique of liberalism. WillKymlicka has developed the most influential liberal theory ofmulticulturalism by marrying the liberal values of autonomy andequality with an argument about the value of cultural membership(1989, 1995, 2001). Rather than beginning with intrinsically valuablecollective goals and goods as Taylor does, Kymlicka views cultures asinstrumentally valuable to individuals, for two main reasons. First,cultural membership is an important condition of personal autonomy. Inhis first book,Liberalism, Community, and Culture (1989),Kymlicka develops his case for multiculturalism within a Rawlsianframework of justice, viewing cultural membership as a “primarygood,” things that every rational person is presumed to want andwhich are necessary for the pursuit of one’s goals (Rawls 1971,62). In his later book,Multicultural Citizenship (1995),Kymlicka drops the Rawlsian scaffolding, relying instead on the workof Avishai Margalit and Joseph Raz on national self-determination(1990). One important condition of autonomy is having an adequaterange of options from which to choose (Raz 1986). Cultures serve as“contexts of choice,” which provide meaningful options andscripts with which people can frame, revise, and pursue their goals(Kymlicka 1995, 89). Second, cultural membership plays an importantrole in people’s self-identity. Citing Margalit and Raz as wellas Taylor, Kymlicka views cultural identity as providing people withan “anchor for their self-identification and the safety ofeffortless secure belonging” (1995, 89, quoting Margalit and Raz1990, 448 and also citing Taylor 1992). This means there is a deep andgeneral connection between a person’s self-respect and therespect accorded to the cultural group of which she is a part. It isnot simply membership in any culture but one’sownculture that must be secured in order for cultural membership toserve as a meaningful context of choice and a basis ofself-respect.

Kymlicka moves from these premises about the instrumental value ofcultural membership to the egalitarian claim that because members ofminority groups are disadvantaged in terms of access to their owncultures (in contrast to members of the majority culture), they areentitled to special protections. It is important to note thatKymlicka’s egalitarian argument for multiculturalism rests on atheory of equality that critics have dubbed “luckegalitarianism” (Anderson 1999, Scheffler 2003). According toluck egalitarians, individuals should be held responsible forinequalities resulting from their own choices, but not forinequalities deriving from unchosen circumstances (Dworkin 1981;Rakowski 1993). The latter inequalities are the collectiveresponsibility of citizens to address. For example, inequalitiesstemming from one’s social starting position in life areunchosen yet so strongly determine our prospects in life. Luckegalitarians argue that those born into poor families are entitled tocollective support and assistance via a redistributive tax scheme.Kymlicka adds cultural membership to this list of unchoseninequalities. If one is born into the dominant culture of society, oneenjoys good brute luck, whereas those who belong to minority culturessuffer disadvantages in virtue of the bad brute luck of their minoritystatus. Insofar as inequality in access to cultural membership stemsfrom luck (as opposed to individual choices) and one suffersdisadvantages as a result of it, members of minority groups canreasonably demand that members of the majority culture must share inbearing the costs of accommodation. Minority group rights arejustified, as Kymlicka argues, “within a liberal egalitariantheory…which emphasizes the importance of rectifying unchoseninequalities” (Kymlicka 1995, 109).

One might question whether cultural minority groups really are“disadvantaged” and thereby, owed positive accommodations.Why not just enforce antidiscrimination laws, stopping short of anypositive accommodations for minority groups? Kymlicka and otherliberal theorists of multiculturalism contend that antidiscriminationlaws fall short of treating members of minority groups as equals; thisis because states cannot be neutral with respect to culture. Inculturally diverse societies, we can easily find patterns of statesupport for some cultural groups over others. While statesmay prohibit racial discrimination and avoid official establishment ofany religion, they cannot avoid establishing one language for publicschooling and other state services (language being a paradigmaticmarker of culture) (Kymlicka 1995, 111; Carens 2000, 77–78;Patten 2001, 693). Linguistic advantage translates into economic andpolitical advantage since members of the dominant cultural communityhave a leg up in schools, the workplace, and politics. Linguisticadvantage also takes a symbolic form. When state action extendssymbolic affirmation to some groups and not others by adopting aparticular language or by organizing the work week and public holidaysaround the calendar of particular religions, it has a normalizingeffect, suggesting that one group’s language and customs aremore valued than those of other groups.

In addition to state support of certain cultures over others, statelaws may placeconstraints on some cultural groups overothers. Consider the case of dress code regulations in public schoolsor the workplace. A ban on religious dress burdens religiousindividuals, as in the case of Simcha Goldman, a U.S. Air Forceofficer, who was also an ordained rabbi and wished to wear a yarmulkeout of respect to an omnipresent God (Goldman v. Weinberger,475 US 503 (1986)). The case of the French state’s ban onreligious dress in public schools, which burdens Muslim girls who wishto wear headscarves to school, is another example (Bowen 2007, Laborde2008). Religion may command that believers dress in a certain way(what Peter Jones calls an “intrinsic burden”), not thatbelievers refrain from attending school or going to work (Jones 1994).Yet, burdens on believers do not stem from the dictates of religionalone; they also arise from the intersection of the demands ofreligion and the demands of the state (“extrinsicburden”). Individuals must bear intrinsic burdens themselves;bearing the burdens of the dictates of one’s faith, such asprayer, worship, and fasting, just is part of meeting one’sreligious obligations. When it comes to extrinsic burdens, however,liberal multiculturalists argue that justice requires assistingcultural minorities bear the burdens of these unchosendisadvantages.

It is important to note that liberal multiculturalists distinguishamong different types of groups. For instance, Kymlicka’s theorydevelops a typology of different groups and different types of rightsfor each. It offers the strongest form of group-differentiatedrights—self-government rights—to indigenous peoples andnational minorities for the luck egalitarian reason that theirminority status is unchosen: they were coercively incorporated intothe larger state. By contrast, immigrants are viewed asvoluntary migrants: by choosing to migrate, they relinquishedaccess to their native culture. Immigrant multiculturalism, whatKymlicka calls “polyethnic rights”, is understood as ademand for fairer terms of integration into the broader societythrough the granting of exemptions and accommodations, not a rejectionof integration or a demand for collective self-determination (1995,113–115).

2.3 Freedom from domination

Another set of arguments for multiculturalism rests on the value offreedom. Some theorists such as Phillip Pettit (1997) and QuentinSkinner (1998) have developed the idea of freedom from domination bydrawing on the civic republican tradition. Building on this line ofargument to argue for recognition, Frank Lovett (2009) maintains thatdomination presents a serious obstacle to human flourishing. Incontrast to the conception of freedom as non-interference dominant inliberal theory, freedom as non-domination, drawn from the civicrepublic tradition, focuses on a person’s “capacity tointerfere, on an arbitrary basis, in certain choices that the other isin a position to make” (Pettit 1997, 52). On this view offreedom, we can be unfree even when we are not experiencing anyinterference as in the case of a slave of a benevolent master. We aresubject to domination to the extent that we are dependent on anotherperson or group who can arbitrarily exercise power over us (Pettit1997, ch. 2).

Frank Lovett has explored the implications of the value of freedomfrom domination for questions of multicultural accommodation (2010).He begins from the premise that freedom from domination is animportant human good and that we have a prima facie obligation toreduce domination. He argues that the state should not accommodatesocial practices that directly involve domination. Indeed, if freedomfrom domination is a priority, then one should “aim to bringsuch practices to an end as quickly as possible, despite anysubjective value they happen to have for their participants”(2010, 256). As for practices that do not involve subjectingindividuals to domination, accommodation is permissible but notnecessarily required. Accommodation is only required if accommodationwould advance the goal of reducing domination. He discusses onestylized example based on a familiar real-world case: the practiceamong Muslim women and girls of wearing headscarves. Suppose, Lovettsuggests, a detailed study of a particular Muslim community in aliberal democratic society is undertaken and it reveals thatwomen’s educational and employment opportunities arediscouraged, generating “severe patriarchal domination,”but the study also shows that the practice of wearing headscarves doesnot (2010, 258). Lovett argues that the practice of wearingheadscarves should be accommodated because failure to do so mightstrengthen the community’s commitment to other shared practicesthat reinforce patriarchal domination.

A key empirical assumption here is that combating patriarchalpractices within minority communities would be easier if the burdenson more benign practices, such as wearing headscarves, are lessened.Cecile Laborde’s analysis of the headscarf controversy in Franceprovides support for this assumption: the effect of preventing Muslimgirls from wearing headscarves is to encourage their parents towithdraw their daughters from civic education and send them toreligious schools where they would not be exposed to the diversity ofworld views found in public schools. Formal restrictions on Muslimreligious expression in the public sphere may make, in Laborde’swords, “members of dominated groups close ranks around thedenigrated practice, precipitating a defensive retreat intoconservative cultural forms and identities” (2008, 164).

Another situation in which accommodation is warranted onLovett’s account is when individuals’ subjectiveattachment to particular practices makes them vulnerable toexploitation. He discusses the case of Mexican immigrant laborers withlimited English language skills and limited knowledge of American lawsand policies. Lovett argues that extending “special publicmeasures,” such as exceptions to general rules and regulationsand public legal assistance, is required insofar as such measureswould reduce the domination of these workers (2010, 260). In contrastto the communitarian or liberal egalitarian arguments consideredabove, the basis for the special accommodations is not a desire toprotect intrinsically valuable cultures or considerations of fairnessor equality but the desire to reduce domination.

Mira Bachvarova has also argued for the merits of anon-domination-based multiculturalism as compared to liberalegalitarian approaches. Because of its focus on the arbitrary use ofpower and the broader structural inequalities within which groupsinteract, a non-domination approach may be more sensitive to powerdynamics in both inter-group and intra-group relations. Also, incontrast to approaches developed out of egalitarian theories ofdistributive justice that focus on distributing different types ofrights, a non-domination approach focuses on the “moral qualityof the relationship between the central actors” and insists oncontinuity of treatment between and within groups (2014, 671).

2.4 Addressing historical injustice

Other theorists sympathetic to multiculturalism look beyond liberalismand republicanism, emphasizing instead the importance of grapplingwith historical injustice and listening to minority groups themselves.This is especially true of theorists writing from a postcolonialperspective. For example, in contemporary discussions of aboriginalsovereignty, rather than making claims based on premises about thevalue of Native cultures and their connection to individualmembers’ sense of self-worth as liberal multiculturalists have,the focus is on reckoning with history. Such proponents of indigenoussovereignty emphasize the importance of understanding indigenousclaims against the historical background of the denial of equalsovereign status of indigenous groups, the dispossession of theirlands, and the destruction of their cultural practices (Ivison 2006,Ivison et al. 2000, Moore 2005, Simpson 2000). This background callsinto question the legitimacy of the state’s authority overaboriginal peoples and provides a prima facie case for special rightsand protections for indigenous groups, including the right ofself-government. Jeff Spinner-Halev has argued that the history ofstate oppression of a group should be a key factor in determining notonly whether group rights should be extended but also whether thestate should intervene in the internal affairs of the group when itdiscriminates against particular members of the group. For example,“when an oppressed group uses its autonomy in a discriminatoryway against women it cannot simply be forced to stop thisdiscrimination” (2001, 97). Oppressed groups that lack autonomyshould be “provisionally privileged” over non-oppressedgroups; this means that “barring cases of serious physical harmin the name of a group’s culture, it is important to considersome form of autonomy for the group” (2001, 97; see alsoSpinner-Halev 2012).

Theorists adopting a postcolonial perspective go beyond liberalmulticulturalism toward the goal of developing models ofconstitutional and political dialogue that recognize culturallydistinct ways of speaking and acting. Multicultural societies consistof diverse religious and moral outlooks, and if liberal societies areto take such diversity seriously, they must recognize that liberalismis just one of many substantive outlooks based on a specific view ofman and society. Liberalism is not free of culture but expresses adistinctive culture of its own. This observation applies not onlyacross territorial boundaries between liberal and nonliberal states,but also within liberal states and its relations with nonliteralminorities. James Tully has surveyed the language of historical andcontemporary constitutionalism with a focus on Western state’srelations with Native peoples to uncover more inclusive bases forintercultural dialogue (1995). Bhikhu Parekh contends that liberaltheory cannot provide an impartial framework governing relationsbetween different cultural communities (2000). He argues instead for amore open model of intercultural dialogue in which a liberalsociety’s constitutional and legal values serve as the initialstarting point for cross-cultural dialogue while also being open tocontestation.

More recent work has emphasized the importance of developing morecontextual approaches that engage with actual political struggles forrecognition and give greater voice to minority groups. Throughdetailed examination of how national museums in Canada and the U.S.have sought to represent and recognize indigenous groups, Caitlin Tomidentifies three principles for the practice of recognition:self-definition, responsiveness, and internal contestation. Whether itbe museum officials seeking to exhibit the history and culture ofminority groups or government officials deciding whether officialapologies for historical injustices are in order, they should respectindividual and collective self-definition, respond to demands forrecognition on terms that align with the terms of those beingrecognized, and accommodate internal contestation of group meanings.As Tom argues, practices of recognition guided by these principlescome closer to fostering freedom and equality of minority groups thanexisting approaches (2018).

3. Critique of multiculturalism

3.1 Cosmopolitan view of culture

Some critics contend that theories of multiculturalism are premised onan essentialist view of culture. Cultures are not distinct,self-contained wholes; they have long interacted and influenced oneanother through war, imperialism, trade, and migration. People in manyparts of the world live within cultures that are already cosmopolitan,characterized by cultural hybridity. As Jeremy Waldron argues,“We live in a world formed by technology and trade; by economic,religious, and political imperialism and their offspring; by massmigration and the dispersion of cultural influences. In this context,to immerse oneself in the traditional practices of, say, an aboriginalculture might be a fascinating anthropological experiment, but itinvolves an artificial dislocation from what actually is going on inthe world” (1995, 100). To aim at preserving or protecting aculture runs the risk of privileging one allegedly pure version ofthat culture, thereby crippling its ability to adapt to changes incircumstances (Waldron 1995, 110; see also Appiah 2005, Benhabib 2002,Scheffler 2007). Waldron also rejects the premise that the optionsavailable to an individual must come from a particular culture;meaningful options may come from a variety of cultural sources. Whatpeople need are cultural materials, not access to a particularcultural structure. For example, the Bible, Roman mythology, and theGrimms’ fairy tales have all influenced American culture, butthese cultural sources cannot be seen as part of a single culturalstructure that multiculturalists like Kymlicka aim to protect.

In response, multicultural theorists agree that cultures areoverlapping and interactive, but they nonetheless maintain thatindividuals belong to separate societal cultures. In particular,Kymlicka has argued that while options available to people in anymodern society come from a variety of ethnic and historical sources,these options become meaningful to us only if “they become partof the shared vocabulary of social life—i.e. embodied in thesocial practices, based on a shared language, that we are exposedto... That we learn...from other cultures, or that we borrow wordsfrom other languages, does not mean that we do not still belong toseparate societal cultures, or speak different languages” (1995,103). Liberal egalitarian defenders of multiculturalism like Kymlickamaintain that special protections for minority cultural groups stillhold, even after we adopt a more cosmopolitan view of cultures,because the aim of group-differentiated rights is not to freezecultures in place but to empower members of minority groups tocontinue their distinctive cultural practices so long as they wishto.

3.2 Toleration requires indifference, not accommodation

A second major criticism is aimed at liberal multicultural theories ofaccommodation in particular and stems from the value of freedom ofassociation and conscience. If we take these ideas seriously andaccept both ontological and ethical individualism as discussed above,then we are led to defend not special protections for groups but theindividual’s right to form and leave associations. AsChandran Kukathas (1995, 2003) argues, there are no group rights, onlyindividual rights. By granting cultural groups special protections andrights, the state oversteps its role, which is to secure civility, andrisks undermining individual rights of association. States should notpursue “cultural integration” or “culturalengineering” but rather a “politics of indifference”toward minority groups (2003, 15).

One limitation of such alaissez-faire approach is thatgroups that do not themselves value toleration and freedom ofassociation, including the right to dissociate or exit a group, maypractice internal discrimination against group members, and the statewould have little authority to interfere in such associations. Apolitics of indifference would permit the abuse of vulnerable membersof groups (discussed below in 3.6), tolerating, in Kukathas’swords, “communities which bring up children unschooled andilliterate; which enforce arranged marriages; which deny conventionalmedical care to their members (including children); and which inflictcruel and ‘unusual’ punishment” (Kukathas 2003,134). To embrace such a state of affairs would be to abandon thevalues of autonomy and equality, values that many liberals take to befundamental to any liberalism worth its name.

3.3 Diversion from a “politics of redistribution”

A third challenge to multiculturalism views it as a form of a“politics of recognition” that diverts attention from a“politics of redistribution.” We can distinguishanalytically between these modes of politics: a politics ofrecognition challenges status inequality and the remedy it seeks iscultural and symbolic change, whereas a politics of redistributionchallenges economic inequality and exploitation and the remedy itseeks is economic restructuring (Fraser 1997, Fraser and Honneth2003). Working class mobilization tilts toward the redistribution endof the spectrum, and claims for exemption from generally applicablelaws and the movement for same-sex marriage are on the recognitionend. In the U.S. critics who view themselves as part of the“progressive left” worry that the rise of the“cultural left” with its emphasis on multiculturalism anddifference turns the focus away from struggles for economic justice(Gitlin 1995, Rorty 1999). Critics in the United Kingdom and Europehave also expressed concern about the effects of multiculturalism onsocial trust and public support for economic redistribution (Barry2001, Miller 2006, van Parijs 2004). Phillipe van Parijs invitedscholars to consider the proposition, “Other things being equal,the more cultural... homogeneity within the population of a definedterritory, the better the prospects in terms of economicsolidarity” (2004, 8).

There are two distinct concerns here. The first is that the existenceof racial and ethnic diversity reduces social trust and solidarity,which in turn undermines public support for policies that involveeconomic redistribution. For example, Robert Putnam argues that thedecline in social trust and civic participation in the U.S. isstrongly correlated with racial and ethnic diversity (2007). RodneyHero has shown that the greater the racial and ethnic heterogeneity ina state, the more restrictive state-level welfare programs are (Hero1998, Hero and Preuhs 2007). Cross-national analyses suggest thatdifferences in racial diversity explain a significant part of thereason why the U.S. has not developed a European-style welfare state(Alesina and Glaeser 2004). The second concern is thatmulticulturalism policies themselves undermine the welfare-state byheightening the salience of racial and ethnic differences among groupsand undermining a sense of common national identity that is viewed asnecessary for a robust welfare state (Barry 2001, Gitlin 1995, Rorty1999).

In response, theorists of multiculturalism have called for andcollaborated on more empirical research of these purported trade-offs.With respect to the first concern about the tension between diversityand redistribution, Kymlicka and Banting question the generalizabilityof the empirical evidence that is largely drawn from research eitheron Africa, where the weakness of state institutions has meant nousable traditions or institutional capacity for dealing withdiversity, or on the U.S., where racial inequality has been shaped bycenturies of slavery and segregation. Where many minority groups arenewcomers and where state institutions are strong, the impact ofincreasing diversity may be quite different (Kymlicka and Banting2006, 287). Barbara Arneil has also challenged Putnam’s socialcapital thesis, arguing that participation in civil society haschanged, not declined, largely as a result of mobilization amongcultural minorities and women seeking greater inclusion and equality(Arneil 2006a). She argues that it is not diversity itself that leadsto changes in trust and civic engagement but the politics ofdiversity, i.e. how different groups respond to and challenge thenorms governing their society. The central issue, then, is not toreduce diversity but to determine principles and procedures by whichdifferences are renegotiated in the name of justice (Arneil andMacDonald 2010).

As for the second concern about the tradeoff between recognition andredistribution, the evidence upon which early redistributionistcritics such as Barry and Rorty relied was speculative andconjectural. Recent cross-national research suggests that there is noevidence of a systematic tendency for multiculturalism policies toweaken the welfare state (Banting et al. 2006). IreneBloemraad’s comparative study of immigrant integration in Canadaand the U.S. offers support for the view that not only is there notrade-off between multiculturalism and the welfare-state butmulticulturalism policies can actually increase attention andresources devoted to redistributive policies. She finds thatCanada’s multiculturalism policies, which provide immigrantswith a variety of services in their native languages and encouragethem to preserve their cultural traditions even as they becomeCanadian citizens, are the main reason why the naturalization rateamong permanent residents in Canada is twice that of permanentresidents in the U.S. Multiculturalists agree more empirical researchis needed, but they nonetheless maintain that redistribution andrecognition are not either/or propositions. Both are importantdimensions in the pursuit of equality for minority groups. Inpractice, both redistribution and recognition—responding tomaterial disadvantages and marginalized identities andstatuses—are required to achieve greater equality across linesof race, ethnicity, nationality, religion, sexuality, and class, notleast because many individuals stand at the intersection of thesedifferent categories and suffer multiple forms of marginalization. Apolitics of recognition is important not only on account of itseffects on socioeconomic status and political participation but alsofor the sake of full inclusion of members of marginalized groups asequal citizens.

3.4 Universalist ideal of equality

A fourth objection takes issue with liberal multiculturalist’sunderstanding of what equality requires. Brian Barry defends auniversalist ideal of equality, in contrast to thegroup-differentiated ideal of equality defended by Kymlicka. Barryargues that religious and cultural minorities should be heldresponsible for bearing the consequences of their own beliefs andpractices, just as members of the dominant culture are heldresponsible for bearing the consequences of their beliefs. He doesthink that special accommodations are owed to people withdisabilities, but he believes religious and cultural affiliations aredifferent from physical disabilities: the former do not constrainpeople in the way that physical disabilities do. A physical disabilitysupports a strong prima facie claim to compensation because it limitsa person’s opportunities to engage in activities that others areable to engage in. In contrast, religion and culture may shapeone’s willingness to seize an opportunity, but they do notaffect whether one has an opportunity. Barry argues that egalitarianjustice is only concerned with ensuring a reasonable range of equalopportunities, not with ensuring equal access to any particularchoices or outcomes (2001, 37). When it comes to cultural andreligious affiliations, they do not limit the range of opportunitiesone enjoys but rather the choices one can make within the set ofopportunities available to all.

In reply, one might agree that opportunities are not objective in thestrong physicalist sense suggested by Barry. But the opportunity to doX is not just having the possibility to do X without facing physicalencumbrances; it is also the possibility of doing X without incurringexcessive costs or the risk of such costs (Miller 2002, 51). State lawand cultural commitments can conflict in ways such that the costs forcultural minorities of taking advantage of the opportunity areprohibitively high. In contrast to Barry, liberal multiculturalistsargue that many cases where a law or policy disparately impacts areligious or cultural practice constitute injustice. For instance,Kymlicka points to the Goldman case (discussed above) and otherreligion cases, as well as to claims for language rights, as examplesin which group-differentiated rights are required in light of thedifferential impact of state action (1995, 108–115). Hisargument is that since the state cannot achieve completedisestablishment of culture or be neutral with respect to culture, itmust somehow make it up to citizens who are bearers of minorityreligious beliefs and native speakers of other languages. Becausecomplete state disestablishment of culture is not possible, one way toensure fair background conditions is to provide roughly comparableforms of assistance or recognition to each of the various languagesand religions of citizens. To do nothing would be to permitinjustice.

3.5 Postcolonial critique

Some postcolonial theorists are critical of multiculturalism and thecontemporary politics of recognition for reinforcing, rather thantransforming, structures of colonial domination in relations betweensettler states and indigenous communities. Focusing on Taylor’stheory of the politics of recognition, Glen Coulthard has argued that“instead of ushering in an era of peaceful coexistence groundedon the Hegelian idea ofreciprocity, the politics ofrecognition in its contemporary form promises to reproduce the veryconfigurations of colonial power that indigenous peoples’demands for recognition have historically sought to transcend”(2007, 438–9; see also Coulthard 2014). There are severalelements to Coulthard’s critique. First, he argues that thepolitics of recognition, through its focus on reformist stateredistributionist schemes like granting cultural rights andconcessions to aboriginal communities, affirms rather than challengesthe political economy of colonialism. In this regard, the politics ofrecognition reveals itself to be a variant of liberalism, which“fails to confront the structural/economic aspects ofcolonialism at its generative roots” (2007, 446). Second, thecontemporary politics of recognition toward indigenous communitiesrests on a flawed sociological assumption: that both parties engagedin the struggle for recognition are mutually dependent on oneanother’s acknowledgement for their freedom and self-worth. Yet,no such mutual dependency exists in actual relations betweennation-states and indigenous communities: “the master—thatis, the colonial state and state society—does not requirerecognition from the previously self-determining communities uponwhich its territorial, economic, and social infrastructure isconstituted” (451). Third, Coulthard argues that trueemancipation for the colonized cannot occur without struggle andconflict that “serves as the mediating force through which thecolonized come to shed their colonial identities” (449). Heemploys Frantz Fanon to argue that the road to true self-determinationfor the oppressed lies in self-affirmation: rather than depending ontheir oppressors for their freedom and self-worth, “thecolonized must initiate the process of decolonization by recognizingthemselves as free, dignified and distinct contributors tohumanity” (454). This means that indigenous peoples should“collectively redirect our struggles away from a politics thatseeks to attain a conciliatory form of settler-state recognition forIndigenous nations toward a resurgent politics of recognition premisedon self-actualization, direct action, and the resurgence of culturalpractices that are attentive to the subjective and structuralcomposition of settler-colonial power” (2014, 24).

Taylor, Kymlicka, and other proponents of the contemporary politics ofrecognition might agree with Coulthard that self-affirmation byoppressed groups is critical for true self-determination and freedomof indigenous communities, but such self-affirmation need not beviewed as mutually exclusive from state efforts to extendinstitutional accommodations. State recognition of self-governmentrights and other forms of accommodation are important steps towardrectifying historical injustices and transforming structuralinequalities between the state and indigenous communities.Coulthard’s analysis redirects attention to the importance ofevaluating and challenging the structural and psycho-affectivedimensions of colonial domination, but by arguing that indigenouspeoples should “turn away” (2007, 456) from settler-statesand settler societies may play into the neoliberal turn toward theprivatization of dependency and to risk reinforcing themarginalization of indigenous communities at a time when economic andother forms of state support may be critical to the survival ofindigenous communities.

3.6 Feminist critique of multiculturalism

The set of critiques that has ignited perhaps the most intense debateabout multiculturalism argues that extending protections to minoritygroups may come at the price of reinforcing oppression of vulnerablemembers of those groups—what some have called the problem of“internal minorities” or “minorities withinminorities” (Green 1994, Eisenberg and Spinner-Halev 2005).Multicultural theorists have tended to focus on inequalitiesbetween groups in arguing for special protections forminority groups, but group-based protections can exacerbateinequalitieswithin minority groups. This is because someways of protecting minority groups from oppression by the majority maymake it more likely that more powerful members of those groups areable to undermine the basic liberties and opportunities of vulnerablemembers. Vulnerable subgroups within minority groups include religiousdissenters, sexual minorities, women, and children. A group’sleaders may exaggerate the degree of consensus and solidarity withintheir group to present a united front to the wider society andstrengthen their case for accommodation.

Some of the most oppressive group norms and practices revolve aroundissues of gender and sexuality, and it is feminist critics who firstcalled attention to potential tensions between multiculturalism andfeminism (Coleman 1996, Okin 1999, Shachar 2000). These tensionsconstitute a genuine dilemma if one accepts both thatgroup-differentiated rights for minority cultural groups arejustifiable, as multicultural theorists do, and that gender equalityis an important value, as feminists have emphasized. Extending specialprotections and accommodations to minority groups engaged inpatriarchal practices may help reinforce gender inequality withinthese communities. Examples that have been analyzed in the scholarlyliterature include conflicts over arranged marriage, the ban onheadscarves, the use of “cultural defenses” in criminallaw, accommodating religious law or customary law within dominantlegal systems, and self-government rights for indigenous communitiesthat reinforce the inequality of women.

These feminist objections are especially troublesome for liberalegalitarian defenders of multiculturalism who wish to promote not onlyinter-group equality but also intra-group equality, including genderequality. In response, Kymlicka (1999) has emphasized the similaritiesbetween multiculturalism and feminism: both aim at a more inclusiveconception of justice, and both challenge the traditional liberalassumption that equality requires identical treatment. To address theconcern about multicultural accommodations exacerbating intra-groupinequality, Kymlicka distinguishes between two kinds of group rights:“external protections” are rights that a minority groupclaims against non-members in order to reduce its vulnerability to theeconomic and political power of the larger society, whereas“internal restrictions” are rights that a minority groupclaims against its own members. He argues that a liberal theory ofminority group rights defends external protections while rejectinginternal restrictions (1995, 35–44;1999, 31).

But many feminist critics have emphasized, granting externalprotections to minority groups may sometimes come at the price ofinternal restrictions. They may be different sides of the same coin:for example, respecting the self-government rights of Nativecommunities may entail permitting sexually discriminatory membershiprules enacted by the leaders of those communities. Whethermulticulturalism and feminism can be reconciled within liberal theorydepends in part on the empirical premise that groups that seekgroup-differentiated rights do not support patriarchal norms andpractices. If they do, liberal multiculturalists would in principlehave to argue against extending the group right or extending it withcertain qualifications, such as conditioning the extension ofself-government rights to Native peoples on the acceptance of aconstitutional bill of rights.

There has been a wave of feminist responses to the problem ofvulnerable internal minorities that is sympathetic to bothmulticulturalism and feminism (see, e.g., Arneil 2006b, Deveaux 2006,Eisenberg 2003, Lépinard 2011, Phillips 2007, Shachar 2001,Song 2007, Volpp 2000). Some feminists have emphasized the importanceof moving away from essentialist notions of culture and reductiveviews of members of minority groups as incapable of meaningful agency(Phillips 2007, Volpp 2000). Other feminists have sought to shift theemphasis from liberal rights towards more democratic approaches.Liberal theorists have tended to start from the question of whetherand how minority cultural practices should be tolerated oraccommodated in accordance with liberal principles, whereas democratictheorists foreground the role of democratic deliberation and ask howaffected parties understand the contested practice. By drawing on thevoices of affected parties and giving special weight to the voice ofwomen at the center of gendered cultural conflicts, deliberation canclarify the interests at stake and enhance the legitimacy of responsesto cultural conflicts (Benhabib 2002, Deveaux 2006, Song 2007).Deliberation also provides opportunities for minority group members toexpose instances of cross-cultural hypocrisy and to consider whetherand how the norms and institutions of the larger society, whose ownstruggles for gender equality are incomplete and ongoing, mayreinforce rather than challenge sexist practices within minoritygroups (Song 2005). There is contestation over what constitutessubordination and how best to address it, and intervention intominority cultural groups without the participation of minority womenthemselves fails to respect their freedom and is not likely to servetheir interests.

4. Political retreat from multiculturalism?

The biggest challenge to multiculturalism today may not bephilosophical but political: a political retreat or backlash againstimmigrant multiculturalism in particular. Some scholars have diagnoseda “retreat” from multiculturalism in Europe and Australia,which they attribute to a lack of public support based partly on thelimited success of such policies to foster the integration ofminorities (Joppke 2004, McGhee 2008). But other scholars argue thereis lack of evidence of any such retreat. Based on their analysis ofBritish policies, Varun Uberoi and Tariq Modood find that legalexemptions for minority religious practices, anti-discriminationmeasures, and multicultural education policies remain in place, andthere is no country-wide evidence suggesting that public services areno longer delivered in different languages (2013, 134). Furtherresearch is needed on whether and why there has been a retreat frommulticulturalism policies.

Perhaps the claim about a “retreat” from multiculturalismhas less to do with any actual changes in state policies and more withconcerns about lack of social unity and increasing tensions amongdiverse groups in liberal democratic societies and the sense thatmulticulturalism is somehow to blame. Consider then-Prime MinisterDavid Cameron’s 2011 speech: “Under the doctrine of statemulticulturalism, we have encouraged different cultures to liveseparate lives, apart from each other and apart from the mainstream.We’ve failed to provide a vision of society to which they [youngMuslims] feel they want to belong” (Cameron 2011). According toCameron, multiculturalism stands for separation and division, notintegration and unity. But the survey of different theories ofmulticulturalism above demonstrates that most theories of immigrantmulticulturalism do not aim at separation but rather devising fairerterms of inclusion for religious and cultural minorities intomainstream society (Kymlicka 1995).

Going forward, public debate about immigrant multiculturalism shouldbe pursued in a broader context that considers the politics ofimmigration, race, religion, and national security. Multiculturalismmay become an easy rhetorical scapegoat for public fear and anxietywhenever national security is seen to be threatened and when economicconditions are bad. In Europe, concerns about the radicalization ofMuslim minorities have become central to public debates aboutimmigration and multiculturalism. This was especially true in the faceof the European migration crisis as over a million people fleeing warand violence in Syria, Iraq, and elsewhere made perilous journeys bysea and land into Europe. This crisis tapped into fears aboutterrorism and security, especially after the November 2015 Paris andJuly 2016 Nice attacks; it also renewed concerns about the limits ofpast efforts to integrate newcomers and their descendants. Evidencefrom across Europe suggests that Muslims are struggling to succeed ineducation and the labor market in comparison to other religious andcultural minorities (Givens 2007).

Socioeconomic and political marginalization interacts withimmigrants’ own sense of belonging: it is hard to imaginenewcomers feeling integrated before they make significant steps towardsocioeconomic integration. Integration is a two-way street: not onlymust immigrants work to integrate themselves, but the state itselfmust make accommodations to facilitate integration, as manymulticultural theorists have emphasized. As Cecile Laborde observes,North African youth in France are “routinely blamed for notbeing integrated,” but this blame “confuses Frenchsociety’s institutional responsibility to integrate immigrantswith immigrants’ personal failure to integrate intosociety” (Laborde 2008, 208). The challenge of integratingimmigrants has been heightened by increasing public acceptability ofexpressions of anti-Muslim sentiment. The rise of far-right politicalparties and their anti-Muslim publicity campaigns, coupled with themedia’s willingness to report, often uncritically, theirpositions damage the prospects for integrating Muslims in Europe(Lenard 2010, 311). Muslim political leaders report that it is“part of mainstream public dialogue” to refer to the“menace of foreign cultures and the threat posed by immigrantsin general, and Muslims in particular, to social solidarity andcultural homogeneity” (Klausen 2005, 123). Muslims have been, inLaborde’s words, “reduced to their presumed identity,culture, or religion, and consequently stigmatized as immigrant, Arab,or Muslim” (2008, 17). The challenges posed by integratingMuslims are thought to be more complex than the challenges ofintegrating earlier waves of immigrants, but as Patti Lenard argues,this alleged complexity derives from the simplistic and unfair elisionbetween Islamic fundamentalism and the vast majority of Muslimminorities in Europe who desire integration on fairer terms of thesort that multiculturalists defend (Lenard 2010, 318).

In light of these concerns with immigrant multiculturalism,multicultural theorists need to continue to make the case that theideal of multicultural citizenship stands for fairer terms ofintegration, not separation and division, and offer answers toquestions such as: Why is multicultural citizenship more desirablethan the traditional liberal ideal of common citizenship based on auniform set of rights and opportunities for everyone? Aremulticulturalism policies actually fostering greater integration ofimmigrants and their descendants? How should we think about therelationship between multiculturalism and struggles to addressinequalities based on race, indigeneity, class, gender, sexuality, anddisability? It is also important to study the development ofmulticulturalism beyond the West, including whether and how Westerntheories and practices of multiculturalism have traveled and beenincorporated. For example, what lessons have states that only recentlyopened up to significant immigration, such as South Korea, drawn fromthe experiences of other states, and what sorts of multiculturalismpolicies have they adopted and why? (Lie 2014)

Bibliography

• Alesina, A. and E. Glaeser, 2004,Fighting Poverty in the U.S.and Europe: A World of Difference, Oxford: Oxford UniversityPress.
• Anderson, E., 1999, “What is the Point of Equality?,”Ethics, 109(2): 287–337.
• Appiah, A., 2005,The Ethics of Identity, Princeton:Princeton University Press.
• Arneil, B., 2006a,Diverse Communities: The Problem withSocial Capital, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• –––, 2006b, “Cultural Protections vs.Cultural Justice: Post-colonialism, Agonistic Justice and theLimitations of Liberal Theory,” inSexual Justice, CulturalJustice: Critical Perspectives in Theory and Practice, B. Arneil,R. Dhamoon, A. Eisenberg, and M. Deveaux (eds.), London: Routledge,pp. 60–78.
• Arneil, B. and F. MacDonald, 2016, “Multiculturalism and theSocial Sphere,” inThe Ashgate Research Companion toMulticulturalism, D. Ivison (ed.), London: Routledge, pp.95–117.
• Bachvarova, M., 2014, “Multicultural Accommodation and theIdeal of Non-Domination,”Critical Review of InternationalSocial and Political Philosophy, 17(6): 652–673.
• Banting, K. and R. Johnston, W. Kymlicka, and S. Soroka, 2006,“Do Multiculturalism Policies Erode the Welfare State? AnEmpirical Analysis,” inMulticulturalism and the WelfareState, K. Banting and W. Kymlicka (eds.), Oxford: OxfordUniversity Press, pp. 49–91.
• Banting, K. and W. Kymlicka (eds.), 2006,Multiculturalism andthe Welfare State: Recognition and Redistribution in ContemporaryDemocracies, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Barry, B., 2001,Culture and Equality: An Egalitarian Critiqueof Multiculturalism, Cambridge, MA: Harvard UniversityPress.
• Baubock, R., 2022, “Cultural Majority Rights: HasMulticulturalism Been Turned Upside Down?” inEthnicities, 22(4): 511–602.
• Benhabib, S., 2002,The Claims of Culture: Equality andDiversity in the Global Era, Princeton: Princeton UniversityPress.
• Bloemraad, I., 2006,Becoming a Citizen: IncorporatingImmigrants and Refugees in the United States and Canada,Berkeley: University of California Press.
• Blum, L.A., 1992, “Antiracism, Multiculturalism, andInterracial Community: Three Educational Values for a MulticulturalSociety”, Office of Graduate Studies and Research, University ofMassachusetts, Boston.
• Bowen, J.R., 2007,Why the French Don’t LikeHeadscarves: Islam, the State, and Public Space, Princeton:Princeton University Press.
• Cameron, D., 2011, “PM’s Speech at Munich SecurityConference,”available online.
• Carens, J., 2000,Culture, Citizenship, and Community: AContextual Exploration of Justice as Evenhandedness, Oxford:Oxford University Press.
• Chambers, C., 2002, “All Must Have Prizes: The Liberal Casefor Interference in Cultural Practices,” inMulticulturalismReconsidered, Paul Kelly (ed.), Cambridge: Polity Press, pp.151–73.
• Coleman, D.L., 1996, “Individualizing Justice throughMulticulturalism: The Liberals’ Dilemma,”Columbia LawReview, 96(5): 1093–1167.
• Coulthard, G., 2007, “Subjects of Empire: Indigenous Peoplesand the ‘Politics of Recognition’ in Canada,”Contemporary Political Theory, 6(4): 437–60.
• –––, 2014,Red Skins, White Masks: Rejectingthe Colonial Politics of Recognition, Minneapolis: University ofMinnesota Press.
• Crowder, G., 2013,Theories of Multiculturalism: AnIntroduction, Cambridge: Polity Press.
• Deveaux, M., 2005, “A Deliberative Approach to Conflicts ofCulture,” in A. Eisenberg and J. Spinner-Halev 2005 (eds.), pp.340–62.
• –––, 2006,Gender and Justice inMulticultural Liberal States, Oxford: Oxford UniversityPress.
• Eisenberg, A., 2003, “Diversity and Equality: ThreeApproaches to Cultural and Sexual Difference,”Journal ofPolitical Philosophy, 11(1): 41–64.
• Eisenberg, A. and J. Spinner-Halev (eds.), 2005,Minoritieswithin Minorities: Equality, Rights, and Diversity, Cambridge:Cambridge University Press.
• Fraser, N., 1997,Justice Interruptus: Critical Reflections onthe ‘Postsocialist’ Condition, London:Routledge.
• ––– and A. Honneth, 2003,Redistribution orRecognition? A Political-philosophical Exchange, London:Verso.
• Friedman, M., 2003,Autonomy, Gender, Politics, Oxford:Oxford University Press.
• Gitlin, T., 1995,The Twilight of Common Dreams: Why AmericaIs Wracked by Culture Wars, New York: Metropolitan Books.
• Givens, T., 2007, “Immigrant Integration in Europe:Empirical Research,”Annual Review of PoliticalScience, 10(1): 67–83
• Glazer, N., 1997,We Are All Multiculturalists Now,Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
• Gooding-Williams, R., 1998, “Race, Multiculturalism andDemocracy,”Constellations, 5(1): 18–41.
• Green, L., 1994, “Internal Minorities and TheirRights,” inGroup Rights, J. Baker (ed.), Toronto:University of Toronto Press, pp. 101–117.
• Guérard de Latour, S., 2015, “Cultural Insecurity andPolitical Solidarity: French Republicanism Reconsidered,” inFrance since the 1970s: History, Politics and Memory in a Age ofUncertainty, Emile Cabal (ed.), London: Bloomsbury Academic, pp.245–262.
• Gutmann, A., 2003,Identity in Democracy, Princeton:Princeton University Press.
• Hero, R., 1998,Faces of Inequality: Social Diversity inAmerican Politics, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Hero, R. and R. Preuhs, 2006, “Multiculturalism and WelfarePolicies in the USA: A State-Level Comparative Analysis,” inMulticulturalism and the Welfare State: Recognition andRedistribution in Contemporary Democracies, K. Banting and W.Kymlicka (eds.), Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp.121–151.
• Ho, C., and A. Jakubowicz (eds.), 2014,‘For ThoseWho’ve Come Across the Seas’: Australian MulticulturalTheory, Policy, and Practice, London: Anthem Press.
• Hollinger, D., 1995,Postethnic America: BeyondMulticulturalism, New York: Basic Books.
• Huntington, S.P., 2005,Who Are We? The Challenges toAmerica’s National Identity, New York: Simon andSchuster.
• Ivison, D., 2006, “Historical Injustice,” inTheOxford Handbook of Political Theory, J. Dryzek, B. Honig, and A.Phillips (eds.), Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp.507–25.
• ––– (ed.), 2010,The Ashgate ResearchCompanion to Multiculturalism, Surrey: Ashgate.
• Ivison, D., P. Patton, and W. Sanders, 2000,Political Theoryand the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press.
• Johnson, J., 2000, “Why Respect Culture?,”American Journal of Political Science, 44(3):405–418.
• Jones, P., 1994, “Bearing the Consequences of Belief,”Journal of Political Philosophy, 2(1): 24–43.
• Joppke, C., 2004, “The Retreat of Multiculturalism in theLiberal State: Theory and Policy,”British Journal ofSociology, 55(2): 237–57.
• Kelly, P., 2002 ,Multiculturalism Reconsidered: Culture andEquality and Its Critics, Oxford: Polity Press.
• Klausen, J. 2005,The Islamic Challenge: Politics and Religionin Western Europe, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Kukathas, C., 1995, “Are There Any Cultural Rights?”Political Theory, 20: 105–139.
• –––, 2003,The Liberal Archipelago: A Theoryof Diversity and Freedom, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Kymlicka, W. 1989,Liberalism, Community, and Culture,Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• –––, 1995,Multicultural Citizenship: ALiberal Theory of Minority Rights, Oxford: Oxford UniversityPress.
• –––(ed.), 1995,The Rights of MinorityCultures, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• –––, 1999, “Liberal Complacencies”,inIs Multiculturalism Bad for Women?, J. Cohen and M.Howard, and M.C. Nussbaum (eds.), Princeton: Princeton UniversityPress, pp. 31–34.
• –––, 2001,Politics in the Vernacular:Nationalism, Multiculturalism, and Citizenship, Oxford: OxfordUniversity Press.
• –––, 2007,Multicultural Odysseys:Navigating the New International Politics of Diversity, Oxford:Oxford University Press.
• Kymlicka, W. and K. Banting, 2006, “Immigration,Multiculturalism, and the Welfare State,”Ethics &International Affairs, 20(3): 281–304.
• Kymlicka, W. and A. Patten (eds.), 2003,Language Rights andPolitical Theory, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Laborde, C., 2008,Critical Republicanism: The HijabControversy and Political Philosophy, Oxford: Oxford UniversityPress.
• Laden, A.S., and D. Owen (eds.), 2007,Multiculturalism andPolitical Theory, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Lenard, P., 2010, “What Can Multicultural Theory Tell Usabout Integrating Muslims in Europe?,”Political StudiesReview, 8: 308–321.
• Lépinard, E., 2011, “Autonomy and the Crisis of theFeminist Subject: Revisiting Okin’s Dilemma,”Constellations: An International Journal in Critical andDemocratic Theory, 18: 205–221.
• Levey, G.B. (ed.), 2008,Political Theory and AustralianMulticulturalism, New York: Berghahn Books.
• –––and T. Modood (eds.), 2009,Secularism,Religion, and Multicultural Citizenship, Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press.
• Levy, J.T., 1997, “Classifying Cultural Rights,” inNomos XXXIX: Ethnicity and Group Rights, W. Kymlicka and I.Shapiro (eds.), New York: New York University Press, pp.22–66.
• –––, 2000,Multiculturalism of Fear,Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Lie, J. (ed.), 2014, Multiethnic Korea? Multiculturalism,Migration, and Peoplehood Diversity in Contemporary South Korea,Berkeley: Institute of East Asian Studies, University of California,Berkeley.
• Lovett, F., 2009, “Domination and DistributiveJustice,”Journal of Politics, 71: 817–830.
• –––, 2010, “Cultural Accommodation andDomination,”Political Theory, 38(2):243–267.
• Margalit, A. and J. Raz, 1990, “NationalSelf-Determination,”Journal of Philosophy, 87(9):439–461.
• Markell, P., 2003,Bound by Recognition, Princeton:Princeton University Press.
• May, S. and C. Sleeter, 2010,Critical Multiculturalism:Theory and Praxis, New York: Routledge.
• Means, A., 2002, “Narrative Argumentation: Arguing withNatives,”Constellations, 9(2): 221–245.
• Miller, D., 2002, “Liberalism, Equal Opportunities andCultural Commitments,” inMulticultural Reconsidered:Culture and Equality and Its Critics, P. Kelly (ed.), Oxford:Polity Press, pp.45–61.
• –––, 2006, “Multiculturalism and theWelfare State: Theoretical Reflections,” inMulticulturalismand the Welfare State K. Banting and W. Kymlicka (eds.), Oxford:Oxford University Press, pp. 322–338.
• Modood, T., 1998, “Anti-Essentialism, Multiculturalism, andthe ‘Recognition’ of Religious Groups,”Journalof Political Philosophy, 6(4): 378–399.
• –––, 2010,Still Not Easy Being British:Struggles for a Multicultural Citizenship, Stoke on Trent:Trentham Books.
• –––, 2013,Multiculturalism: A CivicIdea, 2nd edition, Cambridge: Polity Press.
• Modood, T. and T. Sealy, 2024,The New Governance of ReligiousDiversity, Cambridge: Polity Press.
• Moore, M., 2005, “Internal Minorities and IndigenousSelf-Determination,” in A. Eisenberg and J. Spinner-Halev 2005(eds.), pp. 271–293.
• Okin, S., 1998, “Feminism and Multiculturalism: SomeTensions,”Ethics, 108(4): 661–684.
• –––, 1999, “Is Multiculturalism Bad forWomen?” inIs Multiculturalism Bad for Women?, J.Cohen, M. Howard, and M.C. Nussbaum (eds.), Princeton: PrincetonUniversity Press, pp. 7–24.
• –––, 2005, “Multiculturalism and Feminism:No Simple Questions, No Simple Answers,” in A. Eisenberg and J.Spinner-Halev (eds.) 2005, pp. 67–89.
• Parekh, B., 2000,Rethinking Multiculturalism: CulturalDiversity and Political Theory, Cambridge, MA: Harvard UniversityPress.
• Patten, A., 2001, “The Rights of Internal LinguisticMinorities,” in A. Eisenberg and J. Spinner-Halev (eds.) 2005,pp. 135–154.
• –––, 2014,Equal Recognition: The MoralFoundations of Minority Rights, Princeton: Princeton UniversityPress.
• Pettit, P., 1997,Republicanism: A Theory of Freedom andGovernment, Oxford: Clarendon.
• Phillips, A., 2007,Multiculturalism without Culture,Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
• Rattansi, A., 2011,Multiculturalism: A Very ShortIntroduction, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Rawls, J., 1971,A Theory of Justice, Cambridge, MA:Belknap Press.
• Raz, J., 1986,The Morality of Freedom, Oxford: OxfordUniversity Press.
• Rorty, R., 1999,Achieving Our Country: Leftist Thought inTwentieth-Century America, Cambridge, MA: Harvard UniversityPress.
• –––, 2000, “Is ‘CulturalRecognition’ a Useful Concept for Leftist Politics?,”Critical Horizons, 1: 7–20.
• Scheffler, S., 2001, “Conceptions of Cosmopolitanism,”inBoundaries and Allegiances: Problems of Justice andResponsibility in Liberal Thought, Oxford: Oxford UniversityPress, pp. 111–130.
• –––, 2003, “What isEgalitarianism?,”Philosophy and Public Affairs, 31(1):5–39.
• –––, 2007, “Immigration and theSignificance of Culture,”Philosophy and PublicAffairs, 35(2): 93–125.
• Shachar, A., 2000, “On Citizenship and MulticulturalVulnerability,”Political Theory, 28: 64–89.
• –––, 2001,Multicultural Jurisdictions:Cultural Differences and Women’s Rights, Cambridge:Cambridge University Press.
• Shorten, A., 2022,Multiculturalism: The Political Theory ofDiversity Today, Cambridge: Polity Press.
• Simpson, A., 2000, “Paths toward a Mohawk Nation: Narrativesof Citizenship and Nationhood in Kahnawake,” inPoliticalTheory and the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, D. Ivison, P.Patton, and W. Sanders (eds.), Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,pp. 113–136.
• Skinner, Q., 1998,Liberty before Liberalism, Cambridge:Cambridge University Press.
• Song, S., 2005, “Majority Norms, Multiculturalism, andGender Equality,”American Political Science Review,99(4): 473–1489.
• –––, 2007,Justice, Gender, and the Politicsof Multiculturalism, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• –––, 2008, “The Subject ofMulticulturalism: Culture, Religion, Language, Ethnicity, Nationality,and Race?” inNew Waves in Political Philosophy, B. deBruin and C. Zurn (eds.), New York: Palgrave MacMillan, pp.177–197.
• Spinner-Halev, J., 2001, “Feminism, Multiculturalism,Oppression, and the State,”Ethics, 112:84–113.
• –––, 2012,Enduring Injustice,Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Taylor, C., [1992] 1994, “The Politics ofRecognition,” inMulticulturalism: Examining the Politics ofRecognition, A. Gutmann (ed.), Princeton: Princeton UniversityPress, pp. 25–73.
• –––, 1995, “Irreducibly SocialGoods,”, inPhilosophical Arguments, Cambridge, MA:Harvard University Press, pp. 127–145.
• Tom, C., 2018,Rethinking Recognition: Freedom,Self-Definition, and Principles for Practice, Ph.D. Dissertation,Political Science Department, University of California/Berkeley,available online.
• Tully, J., 1995,Strange Multiplicity: Constitutionalism in anAge of Diversity, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Uberoi, V. and T. Modood, 2013, “Has Multiculturalism inBritain Retreated?,”Soundings, 53: 129–142.
• van Parijs, P. (ed.), 2004,Cultural Diversity versus EconomicSolidarity, Louvain-la-Neuve: De Boeck.
• Volpp, L., 2000, “Blaming Culture for Bad Behavior,”Yale Journal of Law and Humanities, 12: 89–116.
• Waldron, J., 1992, “Superseding Historic Injustice,”Ethics, 103(1): 4–28.
• –––, 1995, “Minority Cultures and theCosmopolitan Alternative,” inThe Rights of MinorityCultures, Oxford: Oxford University Press, pp. 93–119
• Williams, M., 1998,Voice, Trust, and Memory: MarginalizedGroups and the Failings of Liberal Representation, Princeton:Princeton University Press.
• Young, I.M., 1990,Justice and the Politics ofDifference, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.

Academic Tools

	How to cite this entry.
	Preview the PDF version of this entry at theFriends of the SEP Society.
	Look up topics and thinkers related to this entry at the Internet Philosophy Ontology Project (InPhO).
	Enhanced bibliography for this entryatPhilPapers, with links to its database.

Other Internet Resources

[Please contact the author with suggestions.]

Related Entries

citizenship |colonialism |communitarianism |culture |egalitarianism |identity politics |immigration |nationalism | pluralism |religious diversity |rights: group