Talk:Multiethnic society

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This page is rather misleading. Aren't all modern nations multiethnic, especially those of Europe? It is clear that France, Spain, Britain, or Germany are essentially monocultural, but they clearly are not monoethnic at all and are today moving towards a greater recognition of their national minorities (Wales, Scotland, Catalonia, Brittany, Basques Country etc.)

This page seems to presuppose that because European countries do not attract as many new immigrants as the USA or Canada, they are not open to foreign influences. In reality, living in modern Europe is the best thing that a human can possibly do to experience multiple cultures.

If Nation-States were, in the past, under certain regimes, defined in ethic terms, this doesn't mean that it expressed the reality of the time, and certainly not that of today.

Besides, when nationality is dissociated from ethnic origin through equal citizenship for all, which is the case for most modern nations of Europe and America, it inevitably gives birth to multiethnic societies.

The only thing that ancient China, Yugoslavia, the Roman Empire, and the Soviet Union have in common is imperialism, which is the imposition of a dominant nation's policies on that of neighboring, annexed or conquered peoples. These cannot be seriously considered valid multiethnic societies, for they were constructed at the expense of the weaker nations.

Every nation can be, and often is, a multiethnic society. I fail to see how that can be debated. As for a multinational ensemble, I think only modern Europe fits the definition and let's hope that, one day, all the Earth will be politically and economically integrated in a similar fashion. -- Mathieugp

Mathieu, I see what you mean, but I think the polyethnic state is one that actively recognizes or accomodates other ethnicities, hence the line integrate different ethnic groups irrespective of differences in culture, race, and history under a common social identity larger. For example, gypsies fall outside this definition in many countries. Also, the Catalans, and Basque aren't ethnicities but national minorities. Malandi 18:26, 9 March 2006 (UTC)

That was precisely my point. integrate different ethnic groups irrespective of differences in culture, race, and history under a common social identity larger is a very good definition of a modern nation-state. The integration of differences can only be made through a common point of reference, which a common language provides. Most of the time, this common language is the language of the ethnic majority (or else dominant minority) of a given state.

The opposition made, in the very first sentence, between "Multiethnic societies, in contrast to nationalistic societies" is overly partisan in addition to being a false dichotomy. Among States where the majority has defined citizenship in mostly territorial terms, you see various levels of "openess" when it comes to officially recognizing group rights to ethnic minorities. In the "spectrum of openess", there is no such thing as "Multiethnic" societies on one end and "nationalistic" societies on the other. The vocabulary is biased and let people think that nationalism necessarily implies shutting the door to "others" which is not true. -- Mathieugp 18:21, 3 April 2006 (UTC)

You know, I think I agree with the top comment. Nearly very society is multiethnic. Things like "nationalism" and "mutliculturalism" are strategies -- my two examples are, of course, not mutually exclusive -- for managing the relations between ethnicities. While I suppose it is possible to make a good contribution to knowledge through an article talking about the characteristics of multiethnic societies, I must say that in my opinion this is an excessively difficult article to do well, because it cuts across comparative sociology in a way that is not done often in established literature.AnotherBDA 03:32, 4 April 2006 (UTC)

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Hmm, see: French_headscarf_law. That kind of thing can only happen in a multi-ethnic society (it's a collision between different ethnic points of view). I daren't comment on spain so I've left that in, but it seems fairly unlikely that spain is any different. They get a lot of (illegal) immigration from Morocco across the straits of gibraltar. Apparently europe has become an immigration zone, and this is causing rather large changes throughout the region. I'd think at least all EU members would be multi-ethnic societies by now. I guess that the existence of airplanes and automobiles since the last century has changed the landscape, and very few pure single-ethnic societies still remain at all. 131.174.88.151 09:12, 9 Mar 2004 (UTC)

[edit] Croatia?

Croatia is listed under "..that no longer exist". However Croatia oh-very-much still exist, it just stopped being a multiethnic society (and became a monoethnic). So...? --PaxEquilibrium 00:05, 14 November 2006 (UTC)

[edit] Major revisions or complete rewrite?

Looking quickly at this page and the comments above, I'm tempted to suggest that the article could use a thorough revision or rewrite. "Multiethnic" is not well defined, "multiethnic society" could describe as others have mentioned, just about every society to one degree or another. There are assumptions built in to some discussions such as the role of language, violence in the encounter of different ethnicities, etc. A rewrite would have to better account for the realities and shed some of the assumptions (i.e., more of an NPV). It also could discuss a wider range of "multiethnic societies" such as many long existing ones in Africa and Asia. This is a quick evaluation only - maybe there should be an "expert attention" banner on the article page. --A12n 13:17, 3 March 2007 (UTC)

[edit] Current multi-ethnic societies

Umm, is one "Current multi-ethnic societies" list more current than the other? -- Sy / ^(talk) 19:59, 31 March 2007 (UTC)