Augustine Sali.pdfdentity, Conflict and Multiculturalism

8/9/2019 Augustine Sali.pdfdentity, Conflict and Multiculturalism

1/38

Identity, Conflict and Multiculturalism:

Living Together in Cultural Freedom

Augustine SaliSophia University, Japan

: 2011 7 21

: 2011 8 15

: 2011 8 16


2/38

S u b j e c t Culturology, Cultural Sociology

Key words Multiculturalism, Identity, Nationalism, Multi-ethnic State,

Collectivity of Humans

A b s t r a c t A strong and exclusive sense of belonging to one group

can in many ways carry with it the perception of distance

and divergence from other group. Many contemporarypolitical and social issues revolve around conflicting claims

of disparate identities involving different groups, since the

conception of identity influences in many different ways,

our thoughts and actions. As a result of intensifying global

migrations, the world becomes increasingly a place of multiethnic states, with up to 30% of the population coming

from other societies, western liberal democracies starteddescribing themselves as multicultural societies. Even

counties which had traditionally been known as fiercely

homogeneous, such as Korea and Japan, could no longer

avoid acknowledging the ethnic and racial diversification of

their populations. On the other hand culturally diverse

societies are trying to emphasize a strong national identity.

In this context, looking into the experience of Indias

cultural nationalism, state multiculturalism of Europe, this

paper tries to reflect on the concept of solitarist belittling

of human identity and its far reaching consequences and

the need of an inter and intra cultural civic engagement,

to cultivate an idea of collectivity of humans.


3/38

Identity, Conflict and Multiculturalism _27

Identity, Conflict and Multiculturalism:Living Together in Cultural Freedom

Augustine Sali | Sophia University

Introduction

Many contemporary political and social issues revolve around

conflicting claims of disparate identities involving differentgroups, since the conception of identity influences in many

different ways, our thoughts and actions. My own study on

communal violence in India between Hindu Muslim (Christian)

communities reveals that we are still groping for ways to live

together peacefully. Moreover the recent comments of the so

called multicultural democracies of Europe like Germany and

Britain lead us to reflect on the idea of multiculturalism in a

global context of conflicts based on identities. 1)

1) British Prime Minister David Cameron (Feb 4, 2011) and German ChancellorMerkel (Oct 16, 2010) commented multiculturalism as a failure.


4/38

28_ 21

Cultural Diversity and the Identity of the Other

On 4th February 2011, David Cameron, the British Prime

Minister criticized state multiculturalism at a security conference

in Munich arguing that the UK needed a stronger national identity

to prevent people turning to all kinds of extremism. A genuinelyliberal country believes in certain values and actively promotes

them, Mr. Cameron said. Freedom of speech, freedom of worship,

democracy, the rule of law, equal rights, regardless of race, sex or

sexuality, it says to its citizens: This is what defines us as a

society. To belong here is to believe these things. 2) He said

under the doctrine of state multiculturalism, different cultures

have been encouraged to live separate lives. We have failed to

provide a vision of society to which they feel they want to belong.

We have even tolerated these segregated communities behaving in

ways that run counter to our values. Building a stronger sense of

national and local identity holds the key to achieving true

cohesion by allowing people to say I am a Muslim, I am a

Hindu, I am a Christian, but I am a Londoner... too, he said.

Frankly, we need a lot less of the passive tolerance of recent

years and much more active, muscular liberalism, the prime

minister said. 3) He was talking this, with the historical fact as

2) State multiculturalism has failed, says David Cameron, BBC News, 5 February2011, http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk politics 12371994.

3) As Mr. Cameron outlined his vision, he suggested there would be greater scrutiny


5/38


Britain had encouraged different cultures to live separate lives and

yet a section of Muslim youth is influenced by the Islamic

extremist views and got involved in terrorist acts. He added:

Let's properly judge these organizations. Do they believe in

universal human rights including for women and people of other

faiths? Do they believe in equality of all before the law? Do they

believe in democracy and the right of people to elect their own

government? Do they encourage integration or separatism? These

are the sorts of questions we need to ask. Fail these tests and

the presumption should be not to engage with organizations. 4)

In frank language he made abundantly clear he believes

multiculturalism has failed. Any organization that does not stand

up to extremism will be cut off from public funds, and he wants

the country to develop a stronger sense of shared identity. It is the

first time he has spoken so directly as prime minister, but there

are echoes of what has gone before. Tony Blair edged away from

multiculturalism in the years after the 7/7 bombings in London,and his ministers moved to stop funding any community

organization that did not challenge extremism. And what about

Gordon Brown's continual quest to strengthen Britishness?

of some Muslim groups which get public money but do little to tackle extremism.Ministers should refuse to share platforms or engage with such groups, which

should be denied access to public funds and barred from spreading their messagein universities and prisons, he argued.

4) BBC News, 5 February 2011.


6/38

30_ 21

Cameron was criticized by some sections of the society as

discouraging while the debate is spread in various parts of

Europe. In the speech, Mr. Cameron drew a clear distinction

between Islam the religion and what he described as Islamist

extremism a political ideology he said, attracted people who

feel rootless within their own countries. We need to be clear:Islamist extremism and Islam are not the same thing, he said.

There has been intense debate about multiculturalism in

Germany in recent months. The German Chancellor, Angela

Merkel said that the attempts to build a multicultural society in

Germany have utterly failed. In her speech in Postdam in 2010

she said the so called multikulti concept where people would

live side by side happily did not work, and immigrants needed

to do more to integrate including learning German. 5) The

comments come amid rising anti immigration feeling in Germany. 6)

Mrs. Merkel told a gathering of younger members of her

conservative Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party on

Saturday that at the beginning of the 60s our country called

the foreign workers to come to Germany and now they live in

our country. She added: We kidded ourselves a while, we said:

5) Merkel says German multicultural society has failed, BBC News,17 October 2010,http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world europe 11559451

6) A recent survey suggested more than 30% of people believed the country was"overrun by foreigners". The study by the Friedrich Ebert Foundation think tank also showed that roughly the same number thought that some 16 million ofGermany's immigrants or people with foreign origins had come to the country forits social benefits.


7/38


They won't stay, sometime they will be gone, but this isnt

reality. And of course, the approach [to build] a multicultural

[society] and to live side by side and to enjoy each other... has

failed, utterly failed. 7) As part of the debate, Horst Seehofer,

the leader of the CDUs Bavarian sister party, the CSU, said it

was obvious that immigrants from different cultures likeTurkey and Arab countries, all in all, find it harder to integrate.

Multikulti is dead, Mr. Seehofer said. The debate first heated

up in August 2010 when Thilo Sarrazin, a senior official at

Germany's central bank, published his book Deutschland schafft

sich ab (Germany does away with itself), saying that immigrants

are destroying Germany and no immigrant group other than

Muslims is so strongly connected with claims on the welfare

state and crime. Mr. Sarrazin has since resigned. It should also

be observed that such recent strong anti immigration feelings

from mainstream politicians come amid anger in Germany about

high unemployment, even if the economy is growing faster than

those of its rivals.

On the day of the great earthquake in Japan on 3/11, the

National Diet in Japan was questioning Prime minister Naoto

Kan over a scandal on receiving political fund from a foreigner,

7) However, quoting German President Christian Wulffs recent comments, who saidthat Islam was "part of Germany", like Christianity and Judaism, Mrs. Merkelsaid: "We should not be a country either which gives the impression to theoutside world that those who don't speak German immediately or who were notraised speaking German are not welcome here."


8/38

32_ 21

a possible violation of the Political Fund control Law. A few

hours before the tremor, Kan accepted in the parliament that he

was totally unaware that the donor was a foreign national. Kan

said that the donor had a Japanese name but that he had

already confirmed with his political funds management body that

it had accepted the donations in question. Kans political fundsreports show that the donations from a male donor who held a

senior post in a South Korean affiliated bank based in

Yokohama, receiving 1.4 million yen (or about $16,800). Once I

have confirmed the person to be of foreign nationality, I will

return the money in full, Kan told the upper house audit

committee 8). It shows that the donations from a male donor who

was obviously a zainichi (ethnic Korean) was still a foreigner

( yosomono =outsider) and not part of the Japanese society. This

is a political issue with regard to multiculturalism. In fact, Seiji

Maehara, foreign minister of Japan had to resign a few days

earlier over a similar case of accepting political donations from a

South Korean resident ( zainichi ) of Japan. However with the

catastrophic earthquake and tsunami this issue of identity, the

other also seem to have washed away. But the issue is going

to be debated in Japan, although only as an issue of political

scandal or an unlawful act to attack the ruling party. But the

issue should also focus and deal with the foreign identity and

8) Japan Today News (Kyodo News), March 11, 2011, p.1.


9/38


rights of the minority in Japan. The earthquake, tsunami,

radiation catastrophe, however, in Japan has brought out a

debate on how the catastrophe has moved (can move) our

society into a global community of mutual sympathy. 9)

These are some recent issues of how to deal with the

proliferation of ethnic and cultural differences within the nationas national borders become increasingly porous in a globalizing

world. Now let us see the case of India a nation full of

diversity struggling to live together peacefully.

The Case of India and Cultural Nationalism

Despite the considerable success in the political and economic

arena in India, after the years of independence and especially for

the last two decades India did not quite bridge the aforesaid

society politics gulf. The first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru

had accepted that one of the two most difficult and intractable

problems confronting his administration were creating a secular

9) The Global flow of support, sympathy and help is a sign that a common humanemotion is going beyond national borders and ideological differences. It is relevantat this time to relate the idea of foreigners leaving Japan to escape thecatastrophe. Did the foreigners left because they were not loyal to Japan? Thequestion now is: what serious efforts have the Japanese government done to makethe foreigners to think that they belong to this country. The political fund issue orthe civil (suffrage) rights issue of the recent past is a very clear message thatJapan has inhibitions about foreigners.


10/38

34_ 21

state in a religious society. 10) Since the 1970s, the country started

taking notice of these new players in the field, flexing their

muscles in the 1980s, and taking command since the 1990s. With

the steadily growing Cultural Nationalist movements on Indian

Politics, came the challenge of Hindutva 11) , not only at political

and ideological levels, but also at the level of physical violenceand destruction. It provoked overall, a sense of crisis in our

perception and understanding of Indias cultural pluralism,

multiculturalism, and the hoary tradition of living together, even

though separately. 12) While the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) had

been trying to create an impression that it was reluctant to push

through its political and cultural agenda, in deference to the will

of its political opponents, it had, in reality, been covertly engaged

in promoting its ideological position. The most serious threat was

posed in the educational cultural sphere in polarizing society on

communal lines. How is it done in the Indian context?

The aggressive engagement in creating a national Hindu

identity, the Hindutva advocates make their contribution by

engaging in mobilization of people in various levels. In

10) Andre Malraux, Antimemoirs, London:Hamish Hamilton, 1968, p.145; see alsoT.N. Madan, Modern Myths, Locked Minds: Secularism and Fundamentalism in India, 4th Impression, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2003/1997.

11) Hinduness, as seen by the cultural nationalist organizations, and a politicalmovement under the Sangh Parivar (family of organizations) to create a Hindu

rashtra (nation).12) Mushirul Hasan and Asim Roy, Living Together Separately: Cultural India in

History and Politics , (ed.) New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2005, p.8


11/38


government schools in the BJP ruled states and in over 20,000

Vidya Barati Schools and Shishu Mandirs (Kindergarten!) all over

the country, the prescribed syllabi present Indian culture as

Hindu culture, totally denying its pluralistic character and the

contribution of the minorities to the creation of the Indian identity

in history. 13) Everything Indian is shown to be of Hindu originand the minorities are characterized as foreigners owing their

first allegiance to political forces outside the country. 14) Through

a contrived process of distortion and concoction of facts, there is

an effort to reconstruct history and tradition along communal and

sectarian lines. Thanks to these efforts of their dedicated

teachers, tens of thousands of children are growing up with

prejudice and hatred towards the minorities, considering them

alien, and in total ignorance of the rich and composite cultural

heritage of India. A local leader of the allegedly more mainstream

Hindu party, the BJP, claimed on the recent anti Christian

violence in the Indian state of Orissa A maximum number of

Christians were killed, yes, it is a matter of fact, but why? The

Hindu sense of dignity has come to the surface in a spontaneous

manner and they want to protect that sense of dignity. 15) Note

that the cultural nationalists while trying to defend the Hindu

13) Beat back the fascist onslaught in Orissa, Ujjwala, Peoples Truth , Jan March2009, p.24.

14) Nalini Taneja, BJPs Assault on Education and Educational Institutions , NewDelhi,1999.

15) BBC News, 13 April 2009.


12/38

36_ 21

dignity through justifying the massacre is turning ones back on

the Hindu religion. In his book, Fascinating Hindutva 16), Badri

Narayan explores the Saffron Imagining of the Local, and

communalization of memory by the Sangh Parivar 17)

nationalists to see how they view Dalits (out castes) as loyal foot

soldiers in the struggle to protect the Indian nation from foreignreligions (Islam). 18) It was the same ideology that has been in

work in Orissa since the end of 1990s. 19)

16) Badri Narayan, Fascinating Hindutva: Saffron Politics and Dalit Mobilization ,New Delhi: Sage Publications, 2009.

17) The Sangh Family. The Rashtriya Swayam Sewak Sangh (RSS), the VishwaHindu Parishad (VHP), the Bajrang Dal and the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)are the principal affiliates of what is commonly known as the Sangh Parivar.

18) The effort of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) to reach out to Dalit communitiesis the subject of this book. It is interesting to see that the BJP would seek tosuppress Dalit political action as a threat to its Hindu caste, Brahmanical base.Considering the cases of Uttar Pradesh and Bihar states, according to Narayan,discusses the Saffron Imagining of the Local. by focusing on how the Hindutvagroup Rashtriya Svayamsevak Sangh(RSS), or the National Volunteer Corps,envisions village life. He introduces the RSS activist Ramphalbhai, who viewsDalits as loyal foot soldiers in the struggle to protect the Indian nation fromIslam. He also examines how the BJP attempts to co opt and reimagine themeswithin contemporary Dalit discourse. For example, the BJP prefers the word

deprived(vanchit=cheated?will be proper to understand what they intent) to referto scheduled and backward classes, as opposed to the more politically self conscious Dalit(Crushed). Accordingly, BJP ideologues, such as Murli ManoharJoshi, encourage scheduled and backward classes to celebrate their caste identityand to accept new technologies as a means to economic uplift. The Journal of Asian Studies, Vol.69, No.2, May 2010, Cambridge University Press, pp.634 35 .

19) At present the VHP has claimed 125,000 primary [the current nation wideparliamentary elections] workers in Orissa. The RSS is said to operate 6,000shakhas with a 150,000 plus cadre. The Bajrang Dal [youth wing of the VHP]has 50,000 members working in 200 akharas. BJP workers number above 450,000.The BJP Mohila Morcha, Durga Vahini (7,000 outfits in 117 sites) and RashtriyaSevika Samiti (80 centres) are three major Sangh womens organisations. BJPYuva Morcha, Youth Wing, Adivasi Morcha and Mohila Morcha have aprominent base. Bharatiya Mazdoor Sangh manages 171 trade unions with a


13/38


Emphasizing a singular identity of a religious community as a

political force in the Indian context is called Communalism.

Considering religious communalism as a form of fundamentalism

Amaladoss states that a group of people who share the same

religious faith are made to believe that they also share common

economic and political interests. The deep and strong links that areligious faith can provide to knit together a community are made

use of to make that community into a political unit defending its

political, economic and social interests. 20) The minority

communities in India are to be aware of this kind of religious

communalism and take measures to avoid social cleavages.

However, the homogenized and predominantly Hindu imaging of

Indian identity by the Hindutva advocates represent is contrary to

peoples historical experience. A massive survey project by the

anthropological survey of India published in form of a series

called the People of India proves the Hindu nationalists assertion

that Indias culture is only Hindu. It shows that more than four

membership of 1,82,000. The 30,000 strong Bharatiya Kisan Sangh functions in100 blocks. The Sangh also operates various trusts and branches of national andinternational institutions to aid fundraising, including Friends of Tribal Society,Samarpan Charitable Trust, Sookruti, Yasodha Sadan, and Odisha InternationalCentre. Sectarian development and education are carried out by Ekal Vidyalayas,Vanavasi Kalyan Ashrams/Parishads (VKAs), Vivekananda Kendras, ShikshaVikas Samitis and Sewa Bharatis cementing the brickwork for hate and civilpolarisation.

20) Michael Amaladoss, Fundamentalism and the Jesuit Response: The IndianContext, Review of Ignatian Spirituality , No.123, Rome: Council on IgnatianSpirituality, 2010, p.31.


14/38

38_ 21

thousand(4,635) communities inhabit this country and their

cultural profile is rooted and primarily shaped by their

relationship with their environment, their occupational status, their

language and so on, and that religion comes way down in the

construction of their identities. 21) This survey also shows that

Hindus and Muslims share more than 95 per cent characteristicsof various kinds in common and that it is the shared lives that

have given shape to the diverse cultural expressions. Among

other things it also shows that nobody today can be characterized

as an original inhabitant or a foreigner in South Asia.

Identity and Violence

Amartya Sen, the 1998 Nobel lieutenant, argues that conflict

and violence are sustained today, no less than in the past, by

the illusion of a unique identity. He describes his experience that

it was at the age of eleven that Amartya Sen first encountered

murder. The Hindu Muslim riots, which suddenly erupted in the

1940s in British India, were led by instigators on both sides.

One morning when Amartya was playing in the garden of his

house in Dhaka, a profusely bleeding man suddenly came in

21) K. S. Singh, People of India: An Introduction , Calcutta: Anthropological Surveyof India, 1992.


15/38


asking for help. He was rushed to the hospital by Amartyas

father, but his life could not be saved. The victim, Kader Mia,

was a poor Muslim day laborer whose wife had asked him not

to leave home during the riots. But the family had nothing to

eat and Mia had to go out to earn a little income, Mia was

knifed by sectarian thugs who knew nothing about him otherthan his religion. Hence, Sen states: Identity can kill and kill

with abandon. A strong and exclusive sense of belonging to one

group can in many ways carry with it the perception of distance

and divergence from other groups 22). Most of the victims both

Hindus and Muslims in those partition riots were poor laborers

and their families. Even though the victims came from different

communities, their class identity was very much the same. But

nothing other than religious identity was allowed to count in the

murderous world of singular classification. 23) The violent events

and atrocities of the world have ushered in a period of terrible

confusion as well as dreadful conflicts.

Why should someone suddenly be killed? And why by people

who did not even know the victim, who could not have done

any harm to the killers? Sen acknowledged that for an eleven

year old child, the event, aside from being a veritable nightmare,

was profoundly perplexing. However he elaborates this incident

22) Amartya Sen, Identity and Violence: The Illusion of Destiny , New York: Norton,2006, pp.1 2.

23) ibid.


16/38

40_ 21

later and says, that Kader Mia would be seen as having only

one identity that of being a member of the enemy community

who should be assaulted and if possible killed seemed

altogether incredible. For a bewildered child, the violence of

identity was extraordinarily hard to grasp. It is not particularly

easy even for a still bewildered elderly adult. 24) Sen writesthat Kader Mia died as a penalty of his economic unfreedom,

because he had to go out in search of work and a bit of

earning because his family had nothing to eat 25). However, he

was attacked mainly and purely for his religious identity as a

Muslim, or more exactly, religious ethnicity (since being a non

practitioner of ones inherited religion would not give a person

any immunity whatever from being attacked), and he died as a

victimized Muslim. And he concluded that no identity other

than religious ethnicity was allowed to count in those days of

polarized vision focused on a singular categorization. The illusion

of a uniquely confrontational reality had thoroughly reduced

human beings and eclipsed the protagonists freedom to think. 26)

I have witnessed similar experience during my field research

during the Hindu Muslim riots of Gujarat in 2002, a great deal of

hatred and violence between these two communities. Muslims

were targeted simply because they were Muslims. One day I

24) ibid., p.174.25) Amartya Sen, Development as Freedom , New York: Anchor Books, 1999, p.8.26) ibid.


17/38


was surrounded by a group of local youth, suspecting me as a

Pakistani spy and started harassing me. I had to skillfully

escape attacks from the angry mob. Mistrust, fear and hatred

aroused those days among people. They were talking in terms of

only Muslim or Hindu identity, nothing else. The question

that arises is : how does this work?The illusion of singular identity, which serves the violent

purpose of those orchestrating such confrontations, is skillfully

cultivated and fomented by the commanders of persecution and

carnage. 27) It is not remarkable that generating the illusion of

unique identity, exploitable for the purpose of confrontation,

would appeal to those who are in the business of fomenting

violence, and there is no mystery in the fact that such

reductionism is sought. But there is a big question about why

the cultivation of singularity is so successful, given the

extraordinary naivet of that thesis in a world of obviously

plural affiliations. To see a person exclusively in terms of only

one of his or her many identities is, of course, a deeply crude

intellectual move and yet, judging from its effectiveness, the

cultivated delusion of singularity is evidently easy enough to

champion and promote.

Group membership can of course, be important (no serious

theory of persons or individuals can ignore those social

27) Amartya Sen, Identity and Violence , p.175.


18/38

42_ 21

relationships), but the diminution of human beings involved in

taking note only of one membership category for each person

(neglecting others), expunges at one stroke the far reaching

relevance of our manifold affinities and involvements. Amartya

Sen identifies such tendencies as a Solitarist Illusion and

cautions: The solitarist belittling of human identity has far reaching consequences. An illusion that can be invoked for the

purpose of dividing people into uniquely hardened categories can

be exploited in support of fomenting inter group strife. 28) The

illusion of cultural destiny is not only misleading, it can also be

significantly debilitating, since it can generate a sense of

fatalism and resignation among people who are unfavorably

placed. However the alternative is not something called Plural

mono culturalism, 29) because it reduces cultural interactions.

Rather it is a realistic multi culturalism, with cultural freedom

that broadens the horizon of understanding of other people and

other groups, when the ability to undertake reasoned decision

making is of particular importance. 30)

As we see the Hindutva nationalism in India, the advocacy of

a unique identity for a violent purpose takes the form of

separating out one identity group directly linked to the violent

28) Ibid., p.178.

29) Having two styles or traditions coexisting side by side, without the twainmeeting.

30) Amartya Sen, Identity and Violence , p.117.


19/38


purpose at hand for special focus, and it proceeds from there to

eclipse the relevance of other associations and affiliations

through selective emphasis and incitement.

Fear of Small Numbers

Discussing the relationship between uncertainty and large scale

ethnic violence in the 1990s, Arjun Appadurai suggested that such

violence could be viewed as a complex response to intolerable

levels of uncertainty about group identities 31). In that argument,

large scale exercises in counting and naming populations in the

modern period and worries about peoplehood, entitlements, and

geographical mobility created situations where large numbers of

people turned immoderately suspicious about the real identities of

their ethnic neighbors. That is, they begin to suspect that the

everyday contrastive labels with which they live (in what he calls

benign relations) conceal dangerous collective identities which can

be handled only by ethnocide or some form of extreme social death

for the ethnic other. In this case, one or both paired identities

begin to seem predatory to one another. That is, one group begins

to feel that the very existence of the other group is a danger to its

31) Arjun Appadurai, Dead Certainty: Ethnic violence in the Era of Globalization, in Development and Change , Vol. 29, 1998, pp.905 925.


20/38

44_ 21

own survival. State propaganda, economic fear, and migratory

turbulence feed directly into this shift, and it frequently moves

along the road to ethnocide. This primary claim to peoplehood,

territory and citizenship for persons is challenged in the context of

migrants or foreigners. In societies in which all regions have

been produced by long term and large scale migrations, this isobviously a deadly distinction. And because it is hard to make,

large scale bodily violence becomes a forensic means for

establishing sharp lines between normally mixed identities. 32)

Appadurai claims:

[T]he extreme bodily violence between ethnic groups, especiallyagainst ethnic minorities, which we have witnessed throughout the

world in the 1990s, is not just testimony to our perennial bestiality

or evolutionary tendency to wipe out the them to reassure the

survival of the us. Nor is it just the same as all the religiousand ethnic violence over the centuries. The brutal ethnicviolence of the 1990s is deeply inflected by factors which

triangulate a highly specific sort of modernity: passport based national identities; census based ideas of majorityand minority; media driven images of self and other;constitutions which conflate citizenship and ethnicity; andmost recently, ideas about democracy and the free marketwhich have produced severe new struggles overenfranchisement and entitlement in many societies. These

32) Arjun Appadurai, Fear of small numbers :An essay on the Geography of Anger ,Durham: Duke University Press, 2006, p.89.


21/38


and other factors demand that we do not look at the largescale group violence of the past few decades as a merechapter in the story of human tendencies toward religiouswar or ethnocide. 33)

The world is increasingly seen, if only implicitly, as a

federation of religions or of civilizations, thereby ignoring all the

other ways in which people see themselves. Underlying this line

of thinking is the odd presumption that the people of the world

can be uniquely categorized according to some singular and

overarching system of partitioning. Civilizational or religious

partitioning of the world population yields a solitarist approach

to human identity, which sees human beings as members of

exactly one group (in this case defined by civilization or religion,

in contrast with earlier reliance on nationalities and classes).

The solitarist approach can be a good way of misunderstanding

nearly everyone in the world. In our normal lives, we see

ourselves as members of a variety of groups we belong to all of

them. The same person can be, without any contradiction, a

Korean, South Korean, a Christian, a liberal, a woman, a

vegetarian, a long distance runner, a historian, a schoolteacher, a

novelist, a feminist a heterosexual, a believer in gay and lesbian

rights, a theater lover, an environmental activist, a tennis fan, a

jazz musician etc. Each of these collectivities, to all of which this

33) Ibid., p.90.


22/38

46_ 21

person simultaneously belongs, gives her a particular identity.

None of them can be the persons only identity or singular

membership category. 34) Given our inescapably plural identities, we

have to decide on the relative importance of our different

associations and affiliations in any particular context.

Central to leading a human life, therefore, are the responsibilitiesof choice and reasoning. In contrast, violence is promoted by the

cultivation of a sense of inevitability about some allegedly unique

often belligerent identity that we are supposed to have and

which apparently makes extensive demands on us (sometimes of a

most disagreeable kind). The imposition of an allegedly unique

identity is often a crucial component of the martial art of

fomenting sectarian confrontation. Unfortunately, many well

intentioned attempts to stop such violence are also handicapped by

the perceived absence of choice about our identities, and this can

seriously damage our ability to defeat violence. When the

prospects of good relations among different human beings are seen

(as they increasingly are) primarily in terms of amity among

civilizations, or dialogue between religious groups, or friendly

relations between different communities (ignoring the great many

different ways in which people relate to each other), a serious

miniaturization of human beings precedes the devised programs for

peace. 35)

34) Sen, Identity and Violence .


23/38


Our shared humanity gets savagely challenged when the

manifold divisions in the world are unified into one allegedly

dominant system of classification in terms of religion, or

community, or culture, or nation, or civilization, (treating each as

uniquely powerful in the context of that particular approach to

war and peace). The uniquely partitioned world is much moredivisive than the universe of plural and diverse categories that

shape the world in which we live. It goes not only against the

old fashioned belief that we human beings are all much the

same (which tends to be ridiculed these days not entirely

without reason as much too softheaded,) but also against the

less discussed but much more plausible understanding that we

are diversely different. The hope of harmony in the

contemporary world lies to a great extent in a clearer

understanding of the pluralities of human identity.

Cultural Freedom and Multiculturalism

Multiculturalism is often understood as having different cultures

in the same country or region and advocated on the ground that

this is what cultural freedom demands. As a result of intensifying

global migrations (the world becomes increasingly a place of

35) Ibid.


24/38

48_ 21

multi ethnic states, with up to 30% of the population coming from

other societies 36)), the western liberal democracies started

describing themselves as multicultural societies. Even counties

which had traditionally been known as fiercely homogeneous, such

as Germany and Japan 37), could no longer avoid acknowledging the

ethnic and racial diversification of their populations. One of theworld's most ethnically homogeneous nations, South Korean

government and civil society, with the increase of foreign migrants

(more than two million, 2 percent of the population) pay close

attention to multiculturalism as an alternative value to their policy

and social movement. However, that the current discourses and

concerns on multiculturalism in Korea lacked the constructive

and analytical concepts for transforming a society. 38)

The term multiculturalism is conceived as a concept to

address the issues of how to deal with the proliferation of ethnic

and cultural differences within the nation as national borders

36) Alastair Davidson, From Subjects to Citizen , Cambridge: Cambridge UniversityPress, 1997: 6

37) Japan with its ideology of homogeneity, has traditionally rejected any need torecognize ethnic differences in Japan, even as such claims have been rejected bysuch ethnic minorities as the Ainu, Burakumin and Zainichi(ethnic Koreans).Japanese ministers (Nakasone, Aso etc) have been criticized for their commentson Japan as homogenous by Ainu, Zainichi human rights activists as well as theUnited Nations. However, with the increasing number of foreigners in Japan,various efforts are made to establish a multicultural society. However theseefforts are often limited to what is called the celebrationist notion of

diversity(see criticism of multiculturalism).38) Han Geon Soo, "Multicultural Korea: Celebration or Challenge of Multiethnic Shift

in Contemporary Korea?", Korea Journal , Vol.47 No.4, Winter 2007, pp.32 63.


25/38


become increasingly porous in a globalizing world. It was also

accepted as a concept to unite nations with different ethnic

religious identities as democratic political system of governments

spread as a better choice in the post colonial era. Multiculturalism

was variously evoked as a response and alternative to the need

to address real or potential ethnic tension and racial conflict, inthe era of intense proliferation of identity based violence, ethnic

politics and large scale immigration. 39) As globalization has

become generally, if sometimes reluctantly accepted as a fact of

life, the issues which were first addressed by multiculturalism

that is, how to deal with the proliferation of ethnic and cultural

differences within the nation as national borders become

increasingly porous have become increasingly urgent and

complex, even as the term itself is becoming more and more

problematic. As the name for a consensual idea it seems to have

become unworkable, but it is still necessary as an heuristic

concept that points to the uneasy and contested space between

exclusionary and homogenizing modes of nationalism, on the one

hand, and on the other, the unrealistic utopia of a rootless

cosmopolitanism where everyone is supposedly a world citizen

in a borderless world.

39) Ien Ang, 'Diaspora', 'Difference' and 'Multiculturalism', in, Bennett, T., Grossberg,L. and Morris, M. (eds), New Keywords in Culture and Society , Oxford:Blackwell,2005.

http://www.blackwellpublishing.com/newkeywords/PDFs%20Sample%20Entries%20%20New%20Keywords/Multiculturalism.pdf;


26/38

50_ 21

Multicultural coexistence is not a generalized phenomenon. For

instance, re creating the American dream in Germany may not

be the best idea. Skilled immigrants considering whether to stay

is based on other German advantages, including the countrys

ample social safety net, the solidity of its economy, and, some

what paradoxically, the predictability of its regulated labormarket. 40) But multiculturalism as a social doctrine distinguishes

itself as a positive alternative for policies of assimilation

connoting a politics of recognition of the citizenship rights and

cultural identities of ethnic minority groups 41) and, more

generally, an affirmation of the value of cultural diversity. It

meant to ensure that all citizens can keep their identities, can

take pride in their ancestry and have a sense of belonging

(Govt. of Canada 2001). In that sense it is distinct from the

adjective multicultural (of or pertaining to a society consisting

of varied cultural groups). It is an environment enhanced if

individuals are allowed and encouraged to live as they would

value living. The freedom to pursue ethnically diverse lifestyles,

for example, in food habits or in music, can make a society

more culturally diverse precisely as result of the exercise of

cultural liberty. According to Amartya Sen:

40) Tamar Jacoby, Germanys Immigration Dilemma: How can Germany attract theworkers it needs?, Foreign Affairs , March/April 2011, p.8.

41) Will Kymlicka, Multicultural Citizenship: A Liberal Theory of Minority Rights,Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1995; Charles Taylor, Multiculturalism and ThePolitics of Recognition , Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1992.


27/38


The importance of cultural freedom has to be distinguished from

the celebration of every form of cultural inheritance, irrespective

of whether the persons involved would choose those particularpractices given the opportunity of critical scrutiny andan adequate knowledge of other options and of thechoices that actually exist. Even though there has beenmuch discussion in recent years about the important andextensive role of cultural factors in social living andhuman development, the focus has often tended to be,explicitly or by implication, on the need for culturalconservation (for example, continued adherence to theconservative lifestyles of people whose geographicalmove to Europe or America is not always matched bycultural adaptation). 42)

Conservative critics attack liberal multiculturalism (part of the

political philosophy of liberalism and diversity management policies

of governments) as a failure, because it has depoliticizes or

aestheticizes differences by emphasizing the cosmetic celebration

of cultural diversity (the practical expression of which is the

proliferation of multicultural festivals organized by local

governments etc. in areas with a high presence of migrants),

rather than socially transformative struggle against racism or

ethnic supremacy.

Claiming multiculturalism as a failure, the proposal Cameron or

42) Amartya Sen, Identity and Violence: the illusion of destiny , New York: W.W.Norton & Company, 2006, p.114.


28/38

52_ 21

Merkel offered is a strong national identity! That is emphasizing

the national identity, and belittling of plural identity, which is a

challenge to the spirit of multiculturalism. But alternative to

liberal multiculturalism proposed by McLaren is called critical

multiculturalism which sees diversity itself as a goal, but rather

argues that diversity must be affirmed within a politics of cultural criticism and a commitment to social justice. But

alternative to liberal multiculturalism proposed by McLaren is

called critical multiculturalism which sees diversity itself as a

goal, but rather argues that diversity must be affirmed within a

politics of cultural criticism and a commitment to social justice. 43)

The politics of global confrontation is frequently seen as a

corollary of religious or cultural divisions in the world. Indeed,

the world is increasingly taken to be a federation of religions (or

of cultures or civilizations), ignoring the relevance of other

way in which people see themselves, involving class, gender,

profession, language, literature, science, music, morals, or politics.

Global attempts to stop such violence are also handicapped by the

conceptual disarray generated by the presumption of singular and

choiceless identity. When relations among different human beings

are identified with a clash of civilizations or alternatively with

amity among civilizations, human being are miniaturized and

deposited into little boxes. Through his penetrating investigations

43) quoted in Ibid.


29/38


of such diverse subjects as multiculturalism, post colonialism,

fundamentalism, terrorism, and globalization, Sen brings out the

need for a clearheaded understanding of human freedom and the

effectiveness of constructive public voice in global civil society.

The world, Sen shows, can be made to move toward peace as

firmly as it has recently spiraled toward violence and war. 44)In this context let me introduce a theoretical model from the

context of communal violence in India that could be reflected

also in the global interactions of different identities.

Inter and Intra Cultural Civic Engagements

In the context of communal violence in India, Ashutosh

Varshney searches for (a) the conditions in which institutionalized

riot systems 45) are likely to exist and (b) the conditions under

which the state administration is likely to be competent in quelling

44) ibid.45) Cf. Paul R. Brass, The Production of Hindu Muslim Violence in Contemporary

India, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2003. According to Paul Brass,neither single causal explanations of Hindu Muslim riots nor multi causal ones aresufficient to explain such instances of violence in India. As he avers: "It is thecombination of 'objective', underlying factors of demography, economics, andelectoral competition with intentionality and direct human agency that makescausal explanation of riots in general so difficult." All the same, Brass venturesan explanation, bolstered by the fieldwork in Aligarh: that where riots areendemic, what he calls "institutionalized riot systems" exist in which "knownpersons and groups occupy specific roles in the rehearsal for and the productionof communal riots."


30/38

54_ 21

the violence, and he proposes that strong civic networks make the

first less probable and the second more probable. He has put

forward the idea that the presence of high or low levels of

interaction, what he terms civic engagement, can explain why

some towns experience riots and others do not. Based on a 1936

argument by Clifford Manshardt 46) on Hindu Muslim Violence inIndia, that organized as well as informal interactions could prevent

communal tensions and violence, because the strain between the

groups is lessened as the common contacts multiply, 47) Varshney

carried out an empirical study in three pairs of cities 48) in India.

He systematically builds a theory about how such interactions

through interethnic civic associations, work to reduce violence. He

finds that:

In Peaceful cities an institutionalized peace system exists. When

organizations such as trade unions, associations of businessmen,

traders, teachers, doctors, lawyers, and at least some cadre based

political parties (different from the ones that have an interest in

communal polarization) are communally integrated, countervailing

forces are created. Associations that would suffer losses from a

communal split fight for their turf, making not only their

members aware of the dangers of communal violence, but also the

46) Clifford Manshardt, The Hindu Muslim Problem in India , London: G. Allen &Unwin, 1936.

47) Manshardt, ibid., p.37.48) These cities are Aligarh (UP) and Calicut (Kerala), Ahmedabad and Surat (both

Gujarat), and Hyderabad (AP) and Lucknow (UP).


31/38


public at large. Local administrations are far more effective in

such circumstances. Civic organizations, for all practical purposes,

become the eyes and ears of the administration .in the end,

polarizing politicians either dont succeed or eventually stop trying

to divide communities by provoking and fomenting communal

violence. 49)

The figure below shows the dynamics of his argument in

short.

Intra communal

engagementCommunal

violence

Communal peaceInter communal

engagement

Exogenousshock tension ,

rumor

Everyday forms of engagement:

Hindu Muslim family visits, eating

& festival together etc.

Associational forms of engagement: business

associations, professional organizations, clubs and

trade unions etc..

Figure: Communal Violence and Peace

Source: Varshney (2002).

49) Ashutosh Varshney, Ethnic Conflict and Civic Life: Hindus & Muslims in India,New Haven: Yale University Press, 2002, p.10.


32/38

56_ 21

Critically viewing the matter it is interesting to note that for

the author, riots are always a response to exogenous stimuli.

The way these stimuli are processed by existing Hindu Muslim

linkages determines the outcome, namely violence or peace.

Moreover this theory presupposes existing religious/cultural

cleavages and finds out various forms of civic engagementsacross group lines. In the the context of global movements of

people of different identities and cultures, a world becoming

more and more multi cultural, it provides us an understanding

that both inter and intra cultural engagements are to be balanced

efficiently to promote a culture of life and peace. It reminds us

that both everyday forms of engagements and organizational

forms of engagement of different identities are to be encouraged

in our efforts of education and religious dialogue.

Conclusion

Of course, the sense of belonging to a group and having a group

identity is a source not merely of pride and joy, but also of

strength and confidence. And yet, a solitarist approach to human

identity (to national, religious, ethnic partition of the population)

which sees human beings as members of exactly one group can be

dangerous. The mobilizations of Sangh Parivar (family of


33/38


Hindutva organizations) to create a national religious singular

identity in India is damaging the plural and multicultural nature of

coexistence. While in Japan, where I presently reside, civil society

organizations and regional governance try to encourage plural co

existence, there is a tendency of moving toward a celebrationist

type of multiculturalism. But in a real multiculturalism diversitymust be affirmed within a politics of cultural criticism and a

commitment to social justice.

The tolerance that we exercise in our multicultural society

should not only be passive, but in a framework of the liberal

democratic system there should also have courage to take

positive steps to attack on intolerance, but with higher cost and

longer time. There is an important need to discuss the relevance

of our common humanity a subject on which our educationists

and educational institutions can play a critical role. In addition

there is the important recognition that human identities can take

many distinct forms and that people have to use reasoning to

decide on how to see themselves and what significance they

should attach to having been born a member of a particular

community. Indeed, conceptual disarray and not just nasty

intentions, significantly contribute to the turmoil and barbarity

we see around us. The illusion about some singular identity

nurtures violence in the world through omissions as well as

commissions. We have to see clearly that we have many distinct


34/38

58_ 21

affiliations and can interact with each other in a great many

different ways. Intra and inter cultural civic engagements can

make better co existing mechanisms.

Today the human society is viewed as a federation of

communities. However, the human society is to be viewed as a

collectivity of humans 50). The concept of a federation ofcommunities is perceived in various boxes of identities, like

nationality (passport based identity), color, race, religion, language,

culture, traditions etc. The concept of a collectivity of human is a

perception of human individuals with various identities, with

freedom of choice as a free condition. Only such a society can be

a multicultural global society living together peacefully in the

future. This multicultural society will not only be studied in the

framework of political science or religious science, social science

etc, but a human science that can accommodate the individuals

and collective humans. In a world seen increasingly as a federation

of identities, it is important to create an environment enhanced for

individuals allowing and encouraging to live as they would value

living. In the context of identity based violent conflicts, it is then

insufficient for governments to encourage the proliferation of

cultural festivals and enjoying the celebrationist notion of

multiculturalism, rather it is important to affirm and emphasize the

politics of cultural criticism and commitment to social justice and

50) Amartya Sen, Identity and Violence , p. xii xiv


35/38


human rights. In a critical multicultural environment, both every

day forms of civic engagements as well as associational forms

of engagements are to be encouraged to enhance the idea of a

collectivity of humans.


36/38

60_ 21

Bibliography:

Amaladoss, Michael, Fundamentalism and the Jesuit Response: The IndianContext, Review of Ignatian Spirituality , No.123, Rome: Councilon Ignatian Spirituality, 2010.

Ang, Ien, 'Diaspora', 'Difference' and 'Multiculturalism', in, Bennett, T.,

Grossberg, L. and Morris, M. (eds), New Keywords in Culture and Society , Oxford: Blackwell, 2005.

Appadurai, Arjun, Dead Certainty: Ethnic violence in the Era ofGlobalization, in Development and Change , Vol. 29, 1998.

_______________, Fear of small numbers :An essay on the Geography of Anger , Durham: Duke University Press, 2006.

Brass, Paul R., The Production of Hindu Muslim Violence in Contemporary

India, New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 2003.Davidson, Alastair, From Subjects to Citizen , Cambridge: Cambridge

University Press, 1997.

Han, Geon Soo, "Multicultural Korea: Celebration or Challenge of MultiethnicShift in Contemporary Korea?", Korea Journal , Vol.47 No.4,Winter 2007.

Hasan, Mushirul and Roy Asim, Living Together Separately: Cultural India in History and Politics , (ed.) New Delhi: Oxford University Press,2005.

Jacoby, Tamar, Germanys Immigration Dilemma: How can Germany attractthe workers it needs?, Foreign Affairs , March/April 2011.

Kymlicka, Will, Multicultural Citizenship: A Liberal Theory of Minority Rights, Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1995.

Madan, T.N., Modern Myths, Locked Minds: Secularism and Fundamentalismin India , 4th Impression, New Delhi: Oxford University Press,

2003/1997.Malraux, Andre, Antimemoirs, London: Hamish Hamilton, 1968.


37/38


Manshardt Clifford, The Hindu Muslim Problem in India , London: G. Allen &Unwin, 1936.

Narayan, Badri, Fascinating Hindutva: Saffron Politics and Dalit Mobilization ,New Delhi: Sage Publications, 2009.

Sen, Amartya, Development as Freedom , New York: Anchor Books, 1999.

____________, Identity and Violence: the illusion of destiny , New York: W.W.

Norton & Company, 2006.Singh , K. S., People of India: An Introduction , Calcutta: Anthropological

Survey of India, 1992.

Taneja, Nalini, BJPs Assault on Education and Educational Institutions , NewDelhi,1999.

Taylor, Charles, Multiculturalism and The Politics of Recognition , Princeton:Princeton University Press, 1992.

The Journal of Asian Studies , Vol.69, No.2, May 2010, Cambridge UniversityPress.

Ujjwala, Beat back the fascist onslaught in Orissa, Peoples Truth , Jan

March 2009.

Varshney, Ashutosh, Ethnic Conflict and Civic Life: Hindus & Muslims in India, New Haven: Yale University Press, 2002.


38/38

62_ 21

, :

|

.

.

.

, 30% ,

.

.

. .

,

.

: , , , ,

Augustine Sali.pdfdentity, Conflict and Multiculturalism

Documents

Transcript of Augustine Sali.pdfdentity, Conflict and Multiculturalism