National Minorities and Ethnic Immigrants: Liberalism’s Political Sociology

Abstract

This article offers a sustained critique of Will Kymlicka's argument in MULTICULTURAL CITIZENSHIP that a liberal theory of minority ought to differentiate between two categories of ethnocultural groups, national minorities and ethnic immigrants, in terms of the that they should be accorded. National minorities are previously self-governing peoples who have been incorporated into states in which they do not constitute the majority group, either voluntarily (through treaties of cession or federation) or involuntarily (through conquest). Ethnic immigrants are cultural groups who have migrated to societies where they do not constitute a majority through voluntary immigration. According to Kymlicka, national minorities ought to possess self-government rights that enable them to erect separate institutions, and which may take the form of federal arrangements. Ethnic immigrants, by contrast, are entitled to polyethnic rights that facilitate their membership in common institutions, and include guarantees of non-discrimination and even exemptions from laws that disadvantage ethnic immigrants because of culturally specific practices. Kymlicka runs two different lines of argument to defend this taxonomy of ethnic groups and rights, which I term the argument from consent, and the argument from political sociology. In this article, I describe both arguments, and explain why neither can justify the hierarchical distinction that he draws between different ethnocultural groups. I also suggest that the shortcomings in both arguments suggest the limited work that cultural membership can do in a liberal theory of justice.