The Challenges of Multiculturalism

Although the term multiculturalism is often understood on the public level as an ideology or as a social programme (to be ‘for’ or ‘against’), I argue in this paper that the term should also be understood to refer to the complex range of issues associated with cultural and religious diversity in society, and the social management of the challenges and opportunities such diversity offers. Understood in this sense, multiculturalism is not an optional extra, it is not something that a society can choose to have or avoid. For any country without closed borders then multiculturalism is a fact of today—it is present within the society. What is important are the social and political responses to the cultural and religious diversity that results from transnational flows and settlement of people. This introduction to the collection of papers highlights the need to understand multiculturalism as a process which is always contextual, and the role that state management of difference in the successful development of diversity plays.     

Managing Cultural Diversity: North-American Experiences and Suggestions for the German Unification Process

The aim of this paper is to evaluate the usefulness of thinking of assimilation and multiculturalism as strategies for managing cultural diversity. The illustrative case is Germany and its recent unification. These contrasting strategies have been most extensively explored in North America, and these experiences are reviewed through a discussion of the different forms that assimilation and multiculturalism take and the psychological underpinnings each involves. The recent shift in emphasis from assimilation to multiculturalism in Western societies is highlighted, leading to the conclusion that a fundamental contradiction exists between the ideals of meritocracy that pervade these societies and the ideals of collective multiculturalism.     

"Homogeneity" and Constitutional Democracy: Coping with Identity Conflicts through Group Rights

In this article I explore some ancient issues of political theory in the light of some contemporary social and cultural issues. After developing a check list of the virtues and vulnerabilities of constitutional democracy (Section I), I go on to discuss some types and symptoms of difference, conflict, fragmentation and heterogeneity (Section II). I then proceed to a critical review of a particular set of strategies and institutional solutions—political group rights—that are often thought promising devices for strengthening the virtues and overcoming the vulnerabilities of the constitutional democratic form of regime (Section III).
Much of the contemporary philosophical and political discussion of these issues is enchanted by the post-modern spirit of "multiculturalism,""diversity" and "identity." It tends to neglect issues of citizenship and social justice. It also tends to fixate on North American examples, neglecting some of the less benign West European and, in particular, Central East European varieties of identity politics. The discussion here, while mostly raising questions rather than claiming to provide definitive answers, nevertheless tries to overcome some of these biases.     

Malevolent Creativity in Terrorist Organizations

Terrorist organizations are both imitative and innovative in character. While the drivers of imitation have been extensively modeled using concepts such as contagion and diffusion, creativity and innovation remain relatively underdeveloped ideas in the context of terrorist behavior. This article seeks to redress this deficiency by presenting a conceptual framework with which we can understand the complex nature and multiple drivers of creativity and innovation within terrorist organizations. The overriding questions we address are: what factors spark creativity and innovation within terrorist organizations, and are there particular organizational traits that increase an organization's propensity to be creative and innovative? Using insights from industrial and organizational psychology and aided by illustrative examples and case studies from the history of terrorism, we aim to show that the multiple drivers of creativity and innovation are identifiable. By providing a conceptual framework that explores these key issues, we suggest that a much clearer research agenda for these issues may emerge. We conclude with a discussion concerning how our framework can help inform counter‐terrorism practices.     

(Re)placing multiculturalism in counselling and psychotherapy

Since multiculturalism is not fully theorised it has created much confusion in counselling and psychotherapy. It has been criticised for ignoring questions of power relations, and for emphasising the cultural differences of ethnic minority groups rather than focus on their similar predicaments of racism, sexism, misogyny, homophobia and economic oppression. Furthermore, it has not provided clinically useful information within which therapists can conduct assessments and diagnosis, understand clients' subjective distress and cure seeking expectations. This paper explores this issue by highlighting the magical (non)sense of multiculturalism and its racialised forms, and argues that multiculturalism is untenable if it restricts itself to a few marginalised ethno-cultural client groups, rejects gays and lesbians, patronises indigenous forms of healing, and maintains a fixed racialised 'black-white' paradigm of practice. It suggests that a point of departure for multiculturalism from an ethno-culturalism-centred philosophy to one that is pluralistic and reflexive of the needs of all clients (irrespective of ethnicised, racialised, gendered, and sexualised subjective identities) is critical if it is to be useful psychologically. To arrive at this critical juncture, multiculturalism would need to be (re)placed, not disavowed but re-centred in the practice of counselling and psychotherapy to embrace diversity and difference across and beyond the current categories that constitute itself. Replacing multiculturalism in a 'third space', an 'in-between space'—a critical multicultural space—where dominant hegemonic cultural meanings could be reinscribed and where racism, sexism, misogyny, homophobia and other 'representations of patriarchal terror' could be critically interrogated to empower marginalised voices. The paper explores three strategies for creating a 'third space' in multicultural counselling and psychotherapy: the inclusion of white people as clients; the converging of race, gender, sexual orientation, class and disability issues; and the integration of indigenous and traditional healing practices. Bringing it all together under the umbrella of diversity or critical multiculturalism will ensure an ethical and clinical practice commensurate with our current understanding of the complexity and sophistication within which clients construct their subjectivity.     

Processes Involved in Adult Ego Development: A Conceptual Framework

Ego development has been found to stabilize by early adulthood among the majority of the population, at a stage which is well below the maximum potential. The modal stage of stabilization is one which involves rudimentary self-awareness and incipient conceptual complexity. The reasons for this early stabilization below the maximum potential are not fully understood. In this article, a conceptual framework is formulated to explain the processes involved in ego-stage transition in adulthood. The formulation is based on Loevinger's theoretical reflections on adult ego-stage transition and the associated research, the intervention programs designed to promote adult ego development, the theory and research in relation to moral-stage development in adulthood, and the theory and research in relation to general personality change in adulthood. In the resulting framework, it is proposed that ego-stage transition in adulthood represents an accommodative response to specific types of life experiences and that the degree of exposure to such life experiences, as well as the perception of and response to the life experience, is influenced by specific psychological characteristics. Specific research hypotheses follow from the proposed framework, and these are outlined with suggestions for empirical tests.     

The reciprocal link between multiculturalism and perspective-taking: How ideological and self-regulatory approaches to managing diversity reinforce each other

Five experiments tested the hypothesis that there is a bi-directional link between ideological (multiculturalism and color-blindness) and self-regulatory (perspective-taking and stereotype-suppression) approaches to managing diversity. A first set of experiments found that exposure to multiculturalism facilitated perceptual and conceptual forms of perspective-taking. Specifically, a multicultural ideology prime strengthened motivations to engage in perspective-taking (Experiment 1) and led participants to adopt spontaneously an outgroup target's visual perspective (Experiment 2) and to recognize that an outgroup target did not possess their privileged knowledge (Experiment 3), as compared with a color-blind ideology prime or baseline condition. A second set of experiments documented the reciprocal relationship: Actively considering an outgroup member's perspective strengthened both deliberate (Experiment 4) and automatic (Experiment 5) positivity toward multiculturalism relative to color-blindness. These findings suggest that ideological and self-regulatory approaches to diversity management are intimately connected and can reinforce each other.     

Multiculturalism and group status: The role of ethnic identification,group essentialism and protestant ethic

The present research, which was conducted among ethnic minority (N = 109) and majority (N = 649) adolescents in the Netherlands, examined the endorsement of multiculturalism in relation to ethnic ingroup identification, perceived group essentialism and protestant ethic ideology. The results revealed that ethnic minorities were more in favour of multiculturalism than Dutch participants. Furthermore, ethnic identification, group essentialism and protestant ethic were independently related to multiculturalism. However, these relations were all moderated by ethnic group status. High ethnic identification, essentialist beliefs about minority groups, and protestant ethic were related to lower endorsement of multiculturalism among the majority group. In contrast, high ethnic identification and essentialist beliefs about one's own ethnic minority group were related to stronger endorsement of multiculturalism among the minority groups, but not protestant ethic. Perceived essentialism of the majority group showed no effects. It is concluded that social psychology is able to make a valuable contribution to issues related to the management of cultural diversity. Copyright © 2004 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

The French New Right: multiculturalism of the right and the recognition/exclusionism syndrome

This article studies a seeming paradox – the adoption of multi-culturalist strategies and arguments by the neo-fascist European New Right. Why would neo-fascists adopt such a theoretical framework, and why has multiculturalism failed in Europe? In this article, I argue that the European New Right employs a multiculturalism framework, which I define as a recognition/exclusionist one, in order to create a new discourse of ‘legitimate exclusionism’ of non-authentic European immigrants. In short, multiculturalism, by celebrating differences between ethnic and cultural groups, inherently admits that there exist such differences between individuals. This allows neo-fascists to distinguish between themselves and ‘others’, immigrants not sharing their cultural heritage, and to claim the need for protecting such a cultural heritage through exclusion of others. As this article attempts to claim, immigrants will not benefit from multiculturalism, but the right of the radical integralist in its different versions.     

The Philosophy of State Compensation

Notwithstanding that there is now widespread interest in the rights of victims, little has been written about the theoretical justification of state compensation. Here we offer an initial exploration of the field in the hope that others might venture further and examine the points at which issues of compensation connect with other general and specific themes in social and political philosophy. For example, there has been much discussion about communitarian conceptions of civil society but the practical implications of such views, other than those relating to multiculturalism, have been largely ignored. The application of theory to social policy needs to take account of existing laws and institutions and these vary from one society and jurisdiction to another. In what follows we are principally concerned with the situation obtaining in the United Kingdom but the underlying issues are general ones [1].     

Cosmopolitanism and What it Means to be Human: Rethinking Ancient and Modern Views on Discerning Humanity

This paper takes a conceptual look at cosmopolitanism and the related issue of what it means to be human in order to arrive at an alternative conceptual framework which is free from empiricist assumptions. With reference to a discussion on Homer’s Iliad, the author develops a ‘humanist’ model of discerning humanity. This model is then compared and contrasted with Martha Nussbaum’s version of cosmopolitanism. The notion of ‘aspect-seeing’ discussed by Wittgenstein in the second part of the Philosophical Investigations is also examined in order to shed light on what it involves to discern humanity. Finally, racism is discussed from the philosophical perspective elaborated in order to highlight its distinctive conceptual features. It is hoped that this paper can refocus our attention on important issues concerning the basis of what it means to see human beings as human beings.     

Jealousy Workshop: A Conceptual Base and Format

Jealousy is a problematic aspect of relationships that has received a minimal amount of attention in the research and professional intervention strategies. A discussion of a six-session workshop on the theme of jealousy includes theoretical issues, conceptual framework of the program, overview of procedures for each session, and a summary of participant feedback.     

Normative roles,conceptual variance,and ardent realism about normativity

ABSTRACT

In Choosing Normative Concepts, Eklund considers a “variance thesis” about our most fundamental (and seemingly most “authoritative”) normative concepts. This thesis raises the threat of an alarming symmetry between different sets of normative concepts. If this symmetry holds, it would be incompatible with “ardent realism” about normativity. Eklund argues that the ardent realist should appeal to the idea of “referential normativity” in response to this challenge. I argue that, even if Eklund is right in his core arguments on this front, many other important challenges for ardent realism remain that also stem from the issues about possible variance in normative concepts that he considers. Following this, I introduce further issues about conceptual variance. These are issues that arise within the context of the framework that Eklund proposes the ardent realist use to confront the variance theses he considers. In particular, the issues concern what normative role as such is, as well as, relatedly, which roles associated with a concept (or predicate) get to count as part of its normative role. The upshot is that issues about conceptual variance in normative domains might be even more challenging for the ardent realist to deal with than Eklund argues.     

Preventing harm and promoting ethical discourse in the helping professions: conceptual, research, analytical, and action frameworks

The first in a series of 4 articles, this article provides an overview of the concepts and methods developed by a team of researchers concerned with preventing harm and promoting ethical discourse in the helping professions. In this article we introduce conceptual, research, analytical, and action frameworks employed to promote the centrality of ethical discourse in mental health practice. We employ recursive processes whereby knowledge gained from case studies refines our emerging conceptual model of applied ethics. Our participatory conceptual framework differs markedly from the restrictive model typically used in applied ethics. Our research relies on lived experiences of ethics, while our analytical framework draws attention to the multiple levels and contexts in which ethical dilemmas take place. Finally, our action framework is designed to collaborate with research participants and practitioners in making use of our data and interpretations. We demonstrate how the various frameworks inform each other in an integrative fashion. The article sets the stage for 2 case studies presented in subsequent articles.     

Multicultural recognition and ethnic minority rights: A social identity perspective

Questions of multiculturalism give rise to lively and important debates in many countries and in many spheres of life. Diversity is considered desirable and necessary for the development of secure ethnic identities and positive self-feelings, but is also challenged for being inequitable and a threat to social cohesion. It is argued that the social identity perspective offers a useful framework for examining some of the key social psychological correlates and consequences of multicultural recognition. This perspective draws attention to status positions, ingroup identification, beliefs about the nature of ethnic groups, and perceptions of the social system. The first empirical section deals with the endorsement of multiculturalism in relation to majority – minority group status and the perceived nature of minority groups. Subsequently, the endorsement of multiculturalism is examined in relation to perceived structural discrimination, and the importance of social cohesion and stability. In the third empirical part the focus is on consequences of multicultural recognition for ingroup identification and self-esteem. As a set, the various empirical and theoretical arguments suggest that there is not one best approach to managing cultural diversity. Rather, it is important to concentrate on when and why specific effects occur, which means that more systematic attention should be paid to forms of multiculturalism, different groups, and to various conditions and circumstances.     

"What about me?" Perceptions of exclusion and whites' reactions to multiculturalism

A 5-study investigation of reactions of dominant group members (i.e., White Americans) to diversity (relative to racial minority reactions) provides evidence of implicit and explicit associations between multiculturalism and exclusion and of a relationship between perceived exclusion and reactions to diversity. In Study 1, Whites but not racial minorities were faster in an implicit association task at pairing multiculturalism with exclusion than with inclusion. This association diminished in Study 2 through a subtle framing of diversity efforts as targeted toward all groups, including European Americans. In Study 3, in a "Me/Not Me" task, Whites were less likely than minorities to pair multiculturalism concepts with the self and were slower in responding to multiculturalism concepts. Furthermore, associating multiculturalism with the self (Study 3) or feeling included in organizational diversity (Study 4) predicted Whites' endorsement of diversity and also accounted for the oft-cited group status difference in support for diversity initiatives. Study 5 showed that individual differences in need to belong moderated Whites' interest in working for organizations that espouse a multicultural versus a color-blind approach to diversity, with individuals higher in need to belong less attracted to organizations with a multicultural approach. Overall, results show that the purportedly "inclusive" ideology of multiculturalism is not perceived as such by Whites. This may, in part, account for their lower support for diversity efforts in education and work settings.     

Atheism and Nonspirituality as Diversity Issues in Counseling

Counseling professionals have begun to realize that, in order to be as effective as possible, counselors must explore and understand the spiritual and religious beliefs of their clients. The literature on client belief systems and diversity, however, does not include discussion of individuals without religious or spiritual beliefs. The purpose of this article is to (a) suggest that atheism and nonspirituality should be included in the multiculturalism conversation and (b) offer ways that counselors might effectively help and nurture such clients.     

Interculturalism: A new diversity ideology with interrelated components of dialogue,unity, and identity flexibility

Increased cultural diversity has led to considerable debate on how to best promote intergroup harmony within pluralistic nations. In the current research, we consider the nature of interculturalism, a new diversity ideology extensively discussed by political philosophers and policy-makers in Europe and beyond. Interculturalism consists of three interrelated components of dialogue, unity, and identity flexibility. Using data (N = 2,364) from three national surveys in two ethnically diverse nations (Netherlands and USA), we test a new measure of interculturalism and establish its independence from multiculturalism and assimilation. We then demonstrate that interculturalism predicts positive intergroup outcomes, over and above multiculturalism, and is in a theoretically meaningful way related to various criterion measures. Collectively, these studies establish the uniqueness of interculturalism from multiculturalism and demonstrate its promise for improving intergroup relations in culturally diverse nations.     

CONFUCIAN ENVIRONMENTAL ETHICS,CLIMATE ENGINEERING,AND THE “PLAYING GOD” ARGUMENT

The burgeoning literature on the ethical issues raised by climate engineering has explored various normative questions associated with the research and deployment of climate engineering, and has examined a number of responses to them. While researchers have noted the ethical issues from climate engineering are global in nature, much of the discussion proceeds predominately with ethical framework in the Anglo‐American and European traditions, which presume particular normative standpoints and understandings of human–nature relationship. The current discussion on the ethical issues, therefore, is far from being a genuine global dialogue. The aim of this article is to address the lack of intercultural exchange by exploring the ethics of climate engineering from a perspective of Confucian environmental ethics. Drawing from the existing discussion on Confucian environmental ethics and Confucian ethics of technology, I discuss what Confucian ethics can contribute to the ethical debate on climate engineering.     

Incorporating Spirituality Into Core Counseling Courses: Ideas for Classroom Application

Recently, spirituality has received increased attention in the counseling field, and both spirituality and religion have been acknowledged as important aspects of multiculturalism. The role of spiritual and religious beliefs is mentioned throughout the Standards of the Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs (CACREP), and guidelines for working with spiritual issues within various cultural paradigms are emerging. Nevertheless, many counselor educators seem unsure about how to infuse spiritual issues into courses. This article presents a rationale for inclusion of spiritual issues in counselor education curricula and provides activities to incorporate knowledge and skills for dealing with spiritual and religious diversity in CACREP core courses.