Table of Contents
1.0 Introduction 3
2.0 Issues on the Multiculturalism in UK 3
3.0 Criticism on the issues 4
4.0 Conclusion 7
Reference List 8
1.0 Introduction
According to Kenanmalik.com (2014), multiculturalism is the development of the normative framework by the state. The main reason for the development of this normative framework is that it provides advancement in the tolerance and advocacy though providing a cultural differential identity within the state.
In the United Kingdom, the approach to develop equilibrium within the multiple races the state has adopted this strategy. According to Robertson (1992), the main reason behind taking this normative framework in UK was the higher number of immigration within the country after the Second World War. The higher number of immigration within the country has increased the cultural diversity within the community.
To handle this higher cultural diversity the UK government has taken race relation policies to develop the broader aspect of the multiculturalism. According to Lund and Carr (2010), the race relation policy taken by the state had a plan to provide the empowerment support to the culturally diversified peoples through social, economical and political establishment support. However, the report by Rosowsky (2010) has shown that this policy has failed to serve the actual purpose within the country.
According to Bhattacharyya et al. (2002), the worst side of the failure is the development of the sponsored politics within the country through influencing the sentiments of the multicultural peoples. Malik (2010) stated that the present UK society is sitting on the fire and the volcano can erupt any times. Anastasiou et al. (2014) though supported this through stating that the unstructured multicultural policy especially from the political point has created this danger for the state. Therefore, throughout this entire study the issues and the criticism on the present views will be done taking the different school of thoughts under considerations.
2.0 Issues on the Multiculturalism in UK
The main criticism what the UK multicultural policy has received is that the policy failed to provide the required support to develop the multicultural identity within the country and this failure has created a communal chaos within the society. According to the report by Thought (2009) in present condition, the state is suffering from two broader issues one is related to the Human Rights and the other one is related to the Identity crisis within the society. In most of the recent racists events happened in the United Kingdom has shown that the unstructured policies has developed such a community that now became a matter of concern for the state. According to a report by Oakland (2014) most of the female abuse incidents has shown that the multicultural policy has been a failure in the United Kingdom.
On the other hand, most of the racist attacks have shown that the societal tolerance to the multicultural society has decreased very significantly due to the lower awareness initiatives from the local and the national authority. According to Ahmed and Donnan (1994) the promotional activities that the local and the national government has taken neither developed the awareness within the community nor helped the culturally diverse peoples to develop an identity within the state political and social framework. The initiatives taken by the government has only increased the social and the financial burden on the local and the national government.
3.0 Criticism on the issues
According to Malik (2010), the practice of the multiculturalism within the United Kingdom a big failure for the government administration. The latest censuses report has shown that the cultural diversity within the country has increased rapidly than the last 10 years growth. However, till date the white peoples are the dominating the societal and cultural dominance with 86% presence within the community. The following table and the graph will illustrate the very fundamental orientation of the UK community in present time.
Ethnic Group Participation within the community
White 86%
Asian 7.50%
Black/Carrabin/Africans/Black British 3.40%
Multiple ethnic groups 2.10%
Other ethnic group 1%
Table 1: The Social Orientation within UK society
(Source: Ons.gov.uk,2014)
Graph 1: The Social Orientation within UK society
(Source: Ons.gov.uk, 2014)
According to Albrow (1996) the main problem area is the absence of a structured social and the political policy form the government. According to the report by Bhattacharyya et al. (2002) on the multiculturalism, major fault of the policy is the absence of the strong filtering mechanism. It has been seen that the filtering mechanism is so broad that it is allowing even the unskilled peoples inside the country. The other major thing what has been seen in present time is that there is no such social infrastructure has been developed to educate the incoming peoples about the social protocols of the UK conventional society.
According to the report by Oakland (2014) it has been seen that the due to the absence of the ground level support and awareness development program the multicultural community practice has become a social and the financial burden for country. However, according to Rosowsky (2010) the main problem that leads to the failure of the multicultural practice within the country is the wrong use of the political powers. The study by Smith (2001) has shown that the political groups over the time have used the sentiments of the ethnically different peoples to oppose any political moves. On this issue, the head of the commission for Racial Equality stated a different issue. According to the head the peoples who are politically correct and liberal within the country is actually found to be misguiding the other ethnic lobby and this is creating a social chaos within the community through creating a aggressive attitude to the other ethnic groups.
Mail Online (2014) has produced the most shocking statistics. According to this report only in Yorkshire 1400 vulnerable girls are there within the age group of minimum 11 years to maximum 14 years who has been abused by the cross ethnic peoples. According to this, report the Pakistani peoples do the most number of crimes inside the UK other than the white peoples.
The British policy makers have tried to develop a multicultural harmony through imposing the workplace diversity policy. This policy was especially implemented in the social and health care units. The main logic was that the higher interaction would help to minimize the cultural distance between the multi cultural groups. However, this initiative went terribly wrong.
According to Solway and Solway (2014), this initiative has increased the “Institutional racism”. The Lawrence case has shown the brutal face of the institutional racism. The report by Oakland (2014) the local administration has failed to protect the majority portion of the society through trusting upon the Muslim elders. On the other hand, Rosowsky (2010) criticized this though through saying that in most of the cased police and the local administration fears in taking the tough action especially against the Muslim community.
The president David Cameron has admitted the failure of the multicultural practice. According to him, the practice of the liberal multiculturalism has created an identity crisis for the United Kingdom as a whole. He was especially pointed out the Muslim community through saying that this community gets the public money but does not performs any basic duties to control the Muslim extremists within the country (BBC News, 2011).
To control the movement of the Muslims the British president told that the government will increase the scrutiny activities on the Muslim community. Anastasiou et al. (2014) stated that this statement from the British President is a violation of the global human rights. According to BBC News (2011), this statement from the government could create an outrage within the diversified community.
According to through some of the racist incidents it has been observed that the aggression from white community towards the black and the Muslim community has increased rapidly. According to Lund and Carr (2010), the behavior of the Muslim extremists has gone up to such extent that the outrages from the white peoples are very much common. According to Solway and Solway (2014), to a certain level the UK government has provided support to the Muslim community through distributing the public funds and the community support but they have not stopped the terrorism activities and this has disturbed the communal harmony within the UK society and as a extended effect of this the other communities are getting affected. This chain of consequences has created a communal chaos within the society and this could create an inside war anytime.
According to Rosowsky (2010), the unstructured social program has failed to develop the identity feeling within the diverse community. The study by Anastasiou et al. (2014) has shown that the community support program and the diversity policy is so poorly structured that it failed to decrease the difference between the diversified ethnic community. However, Oakland (2014) according to the core beliefs of the non-white community has increased the communal distance. Through Lund and Carr (2010) stated that it is the responsibility of the both community to deliver the communal harmony thoughts within the opposite community and no one has performed this duty. On the social policy failure, Solway and Solway (2014) stated that the monitoring of the implementation and the identification of the gaps were not done, neither by either the local administration nor by the policy maker and this has increased the distance between the communities.
4.0 Conclusion
The increasing communal distance has created an internal chaos within the society. This chaos in recent days has created such a condition that the outrage can damage the whole identity of the nation. The major criticism that the UK initiative has attracted is that the policy is not structured and though out the entire study it has been seen that the policies failed to make an positive impact due to three reasons one is the lower political commitment, unstructured community support program and incremental institutional racism. Therefore, the critic on the UK multicultural policy is majorly justified and visible enough.
Reference List
Books
Ahmed, A.S. and Donnan, H. (1994) Islam, Globalization and Postmodernity, edn. London: Routledge.
Albrow, M. (1996) The Global Age: State and Society Beyond Modernity, edn. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Bhattacharyya, G., Gabriel, J. and Small, S. (2002) Race and Power: Global Racism in the twenty-first century, edn. London: Routledge.
Robertson, R. (1992) Globalization: Social Theory and Global Culture, edn. London: Sage.
Smith, M.P. (2001) Transnational Urbanism: Locating Globalisation, edn. Oxford: Blackwell.
Journals
Anastasiou, D., Kauffman, J. and Michail, D. (2014). Disability in Multicultural Theory: Conceptual and Social Justice Issues. Journal of Disability Policy Studies.
Lund, D. and Carr, P. (2010). Exposing Privilege and Racism in The Great White North : Tackling Whiteness and Identity Issues in Canadian Education. Multicultural Perspectives, 12(4), pp.229-234.
Malik, S. (2010). From multicultural programming to diasporic television: situating the UK in a European context. Media History, 16(1), pp.123-128.
Oakland, T. (2014). An Epilogue: Issues and Implications for Incorporating Multicultural Issues in the International School Psychology Association’s Professional Preparation Guidelines. International Journal of School & Educational Psychology, 2(3), pp.231-234.
Rosowsky, A. (2010). ‘Writing it in English’: script choices among young multilingual Muslims in the UK. Journal of Multilingual and Multicultural Development, 31(2), pp.163-179.
Websites
BBC News, (2011). Multiculturalism has failed – PM. [online] Available at: http://www.bbc.com/news/uk-politics-12371994 [Accessed 30 Dec. 2014].
Kenanmalik.com, (2014). Kenan Malik’s essay on the problems of multiculturalism. [online] Available at: http://www.kenanmalik.com/essays/against_mc.html [Accessed 30 Dec. 2014].
Mail Online, (2014). The State’s fear of seeming ‘racist’ is letting evil thrive. [online] Available at: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/debate/article-2736283/From-sex-abuse-gangs-jihadis-State-s-fear-racist-letting-evil-thrive.html [Accessed 30 Dec. 2014].
Ons.gov.uk, (2014). Census data by release – ONS. [online] Available at: http://www.ons.gov.uk/ons/guide-method/census/2011/census-data/2011-census-data-catalogue/census-data-quick-view/index.html [Accessed 30 Dec. 2014].
Solway, D. and Solway, D. (2014). The Problem With Multiculturalism | FrontPage Magazine. [online] Frontpagemag.com. Available at: http://www.frontpagemag.com/2012/david-solway/the-problem-with-multiculturalism/ [Accessed 30 Dec. 2014].
Thought, C. (2009). Peculiar, Bracing Cosmopolitanisms among the Colonized in the Twilight of Empire. [online] Vimeo. Available at: http://www.vimeo.com/3155913 [Accessed 30 Dec. 2014].
