Multiculturalism and Citizenship — The Malaysian Experience

Abstract

Multiculturalism is a loaded term with multiple meanings. Critical of the simplistic, superficial or idealized ways in which both its opponents and advocates used the term, David Goldberg prefers to talk about the ‘multicultural conditions’ instead (Goldberg, 1994, pp. 1–2). Will Kymlicka, on the other hand, uses multiculturalism in a normative sense, as ‘ideas about the legal and political accommodation of ethnic diversity’ (Kymlicka, 2010, p. 97). For him, multiculturalism is ‘a political project that attempts to redefine the relationship between ethno-cultural minorities and the state through the adoption of new laws, policies or institutions’ (Kymlicka, 2010, p. 99). Kymlicka is referring specifically to the historical adoption of policies of multiculturalism by specific Western countries such as Canada and Australia from the 1970s. He situates the emergence of these ideas in the globalization of human rights norms after the Second World War. At the international level, principles of equality and anti-discrimination are increasingly applied to cultural and religious minority groups as well as indigenous peoples. Rights to the preservation of cultural and religious identity have incrementally become the object of intergovernmental support through measures such as legislative change (Koenig, 2008). This general global trend evolves in an interactive way with the national processes of articulation of multiculturalism policies in several Western countries.