In a major speech the Prime Minister reflected on the role of multiculturalism in a modern and evolving society.
In preparation for his lecture, the fifth in the Our Nation’s Future series, Tony Blair considered the following paper - one of those written by a range of experts in the field.
The authors are independent, and all views and opinions are their own. They do not necessarily agree with Government policy, but each makes an interesting contribution to the debate.
About the expert
Lord Bhiku Parekh is a Britain-based political scientist and a member of the House of Lords.
Read the paper
Two Ideas of Multiculturalism
Unlike the Canadian, Australian, Indian and other discussions of multiculturalism, the British discourse is marked by a striking paradox. Many people welcome the fact that Britain is a multicultural society and delight in its cultural diversity. Some of them however endorse multiculturalism while others reject it. How is it possible to welcome multicultural society but reject multiculturalism? And how can those who agree on the value of cultural diversity take such diametrically opposite views on multiculturalism? There are several explanations, the most important being the two different ways in which the term ‘multiculturalism’ is generally defined in Britain and elsewhere.
For some multiculturalism stands for cultural isolationism or ghettoization, based on the relativist view that every cultural community is self-contained and self-authenticating and has a right to live by its norms. Outsiders cannot judge or criticize it and should respect its autonomy. Multiculturalism in this sense clearly undermines any kind of shared life. More importantly, it also militates against the multicultural society itself. The latter arises because different cultures do not passively coexist but interact and influence each other, something that multiculturalism defined in this way disallows. Champions of multicultural society therefore see multiculturalism as their enemy, and wage an open or subdued war against it (see Johnson). We might call this the static, isolationist or relativist view of multiculturalism.
Those who welcome multiculturalism, and see no tension between it and multicultural society, define it very differently. For them it stands for the view that every culture has its limitations and benefits from a dialogue with others. Such a dialogue alerts it to new visions of human life, expands its imagination, enables it to look at itself from the standpoint of others, adds to its self-knowledge, and creates the conditions of human freedom and rationality. The dialogue requires that different cultures should both be respected and brought into a creative interplay. It challenges the hegemony of the dominant culture, exposes its biases and limitations, and helps create a composite culture in which they can see something of themselves and which they can own with pride as their common achievement. Multiculturalism in this sense is open, interactive, dynamic and creative. Its main policy concern is to create conditions and devise programmes such that different cultural communities feel valued and respected, are integrated in appropriate ways, and interact within an agreed system of rights and obligations. It is basically a celebration and philosophical justification of multicultural society (see Clarke, Gilmour and Garner). We might call this the interactive, dialogical or pluralist view of multiculturalism.
The two senses of multiculturalism could not be more different. The first is
multi-culturalism, the second multicultural-ism. The former is committed to the plurality of self-contained cultures, the latter to interactive cultural diversity and a single but internally plural composite culture. The first sense of the term is largely limited to some philosophers and to nationalist writers opposed to multicultural society. The second sense is older in its origin and more common. This is how the term is used in Canada, Australia and other countries that pioneered and remain committed to multiculturalism. The British discourse on multiculturalism began in the early 1970s. Although the term was used in both senses, the second dialogical sense was generally dominant, as becomes clear in the Rampton Report, the Swann Report, the Runnymede report on the Future of Multi-Ethnic Britain, and many other academic and popular writings. It is a pity that this discourse has been muddled in recent years by some influential figures, who for their own different reasons have started defining multiculturalism in the first sense of isolation and ghettoization.
In Britain then the term multiculturalism is used in two different senses. Since the participants to the debate fail to distinguish them, they constantly talk past each other. What is more, their internal division gives encouragement and even legitimacy to those opposed to the multicultural society itself. Although we cannot legislate or arrive at a consensus on how the term should be used, we are entitled to expect that those engaged in the debate will take care to ascertain how others use the term, and concentrate on substantive issues rather than engage in a banal verbal warfare.
Identity
The concept of identity is far more complex then is generally appreciated. It was originally used in relation to individuals to answer such questions as how one remains the same in the midst of change, holds together different aspects of one’s life in a unitary sense of oneself, and distinguishes oneself from others and defines one’s individuality. The tradition of philosophical discourse to which these questions gave rise acquired a new direction and eventually lost much of its coherence when the term identity was appropriated and used to answer different sorts of questions by psychoanalysts, and later by social psychologists and sociologists. It has now entered popular discourse, and has become so inflated that it is in danger of losing its analytical and explanatory power.
Identity basically refers to how one identifies and defines oneself in relation to others. It is a way of announcing to the world and affirming to oneself who one is and how one positions oneself in the relevant area of life (see Clarke, Gilmore and Garner). It is commonly said that an individual has multiple identities, and the which of these one emphasizes depends on the context. This credit-card view of identity, whose echoes one finds in Amartya Sen’s otherwise perceptive Identity and Violence, is deeply problematic. To say that one ‘has’ multiple identities is to imply that identities are possessions rather than forms of relationship; also that they are fixed and objective rather than constantly in the making and products of human decisions (see Brah). It also implies that the bearer of multiple identities somehow transcends them all and has a unitary and elusive core. Identities do not and cannot passively coexist either, for they form part of an individual’s life and cannot be neatly compartmentalized. They overlap, interact and shape each other (see Rogaly and Taylor).
Identities also conflict and need an ordering principle if their bearer is not to suffer from schizophrenia. Identities are not and cannot be equally important either. The fact that one is tall or dark or a golfer or a Rotarian is not as significant a part of one’s life as the fact that one is a mother or a lover. We would worry about the man who said it was. Different identities play different roles in human life, and some of these are more basic. One’s sexual identity is a biological fact about oneself, and does not tell one how to lead one’s life, including how to define one’s sexual identity itself. Ethnic, religious, racial, political, professional and other identities have different logics and modes of operation, and should not be homogenized. Just as no single identity should be essentialized, the idea of identity too should not be essentialized. Since the religious identity is becoming dominant and is supposed to stand in the way of integration, I shall confine my comments to it.
Human beings generally aim to lead more or less coherent lives, and need broad principles and values to guide their choices. The latter constitute their moral identity. Some individuals base these principles on rational grounds and define their moral identity in secular terms. Others embed it in religion. Their religious identity constitutes the axis of their lives and provides the overarching framework within which they define and relate their other identities. Many Christians, Muslims, Jews and others agonize about how they can be good doctors, teachers, husbands and neighbours, asking in each case what their religious values require them to do in these areas. Muslims have gone further, and set up associations of Muslim professionals and even social scientists where they deliberate on how to bring the Islamic perspective to bear on their work.
When individuals privilege their religious identity in this way, difficulties arise. Take British Muslims. Many of them do not just want to be Muslims in Britain, treating Britain as a morally neutral territorial space where they happen to live. Rather they take their British citizenship seriously and want to be good Britons. However, they want to be Muslim Britons not British Muslims, that is, British in a Muslim way rather than Muslims in a British way. The latter privileges their British identity and requires them to read and practise their religion according to British values and practices. They want to do the opposite, and draw on Islam to help them decide the nature and content of their British citizenship (see Dilwar Hussain).
This can take two forms. They might accept British values and practices but derive their grounds and motivations from Islam. Like other Britons they too are loyal to the country and respect its values and institutions, but for their own reasons. This is common in a multicultural society where different cultural communities agree or converge on a common body of values on different meta-ethical grounds.
Being a Muslim Briton can also take another and more intractable form. One might take a stand on one’s religious identity, judge British values and practices by it, and accept only those that conform to it. One might, for example, reject the equality or mixing of sexes. This is easily handled, as we have successfully done over the years. A Muslim Briton might go further, privilege the ummah over Britain, and conclude that when their demands conflict, the ummah should prevail. He might therefore think it perfectly proper, indeed a moral duty, to go and fight against British forces in Afghanistan and Iraq. The logic is impeccable, and it is surprising that many people in Britain were surprised when some young Muslims made that choice. A Muslim Briton who bases his entire life on a particular reading of his religion might also reject the country’s secular and ‘permissive’ ethos and withdraw into an inner world of rage and revolt.
Our biggest challenge is how to respond to this. It would not do to say that all British citizens should privilege their political identity and show undivided loyalty to the country. This is one view, but there are others, and it is not convincing in its absolutist form. The country should certainly matter, but why should it always trump other loyalties? After all, we disobey laws when they violate our conscience or when our government is engaged in an immoral war abroad.
In dealing with someone who wants to be a Muslim Briton, rational discussion is certainly important, and we need to show him why the claims of the ummah should be balanced against those of his country and are best pursued in other ways. Such discussion, however, is rarely conclusive and is unlikely to deter him. What is more, his reading of his religion, like that of anyone else, is necessarily shaped by the experiences and assumptions that he brings to it, and cannot be challenged in textual terms alone. We need to ask why he so heavily privileges his religious identity, defines it in such narrow and exclusive terms, and disregards the moral claims of his political identity, and to find ways of altering the way in which he structures and relates these two (and other) identities. The way an individual defines and relates his identities is the result of a complex interplay between his self-understanding and the manner in which he is treated by the wider society. We can do little directly about the former, and should concentrate on the latter.
Individuals become obsessed with a single identity when it is the only one available to them. When, like this, it is their sole source of meaning and pride, their only bond with others, and their only way of forming part of a collective narrative, they tend to define it in sharp and exclusive norms. It is therefore of vital importance that they should acquire other meaningful identities, such as the occupational, the civic, and the political. This requires opportunities to pursue meaningful careers, to participate in local and national affairs, to put down local roots, and so on. All this is rightly stressed in many of the chapters in this collection.
I want to say something about political identity because it is often misunderstood. It is no use exhorting people to become or feel British. Being British must become part of their lived reality, a matter of daily experience, so that it emerges naturally from and is constantly nurtured by their relationships with those around them. It is therefore essential that the wider society should regard all its citizens as its legitimate members, treat them equally with the rest, ensure them equal rights and opportunities, and address the injustices and disadvantages to which some of them might be subject (see Johnson).
We also need to be clear about what we want when we ask people to be British. Being British is one of a range of their identities. It can neither take their place nor dominate them. It needs to come to terms with them, and within agreed limits respect them. Just as a language can be spoken in different accents, being British must accommodate plurality and allow people to be British in their own different ways. It must also be open and loosely structured. The religious and ethnic identities, for example, point to fellow-religionists and fellow-ethnics beyond the territorial boundaries of Britain to whom different groups of British citizens might feel attached. There is no reason why such supra-national allegiances should be frowned upon, or detract from their British identity.
Being British basically means three things: commitment to Britain and its people, loyalty to its legal and political institutions, and respect for the values and norms that are central to its way of life. These three are integral to its stability and vitality, and can rightly be demanded of all its citizens. A view of social cohesion that goes beyond this and requires that they intermarry, share a common view of British history, take pride in it, and so on, asks far more than what is possible, necessary and desirable (see Wetherell). Being British is about being committed and bound to Britain, and is a form of relationship. Since the increasingly popular term ‘Britishness’ is non-relational, and stresses passive attributes, has an essentialist orientation, is inherently vague, and can be easily used to disqualify any group that appears to show insufficient Britishness, it is a source of much confusion and mischief, and is best avoided.
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