Blog Summary: What have we learnt?

         Thankyou to everyone that read my blog. This is sadly the last post, but I hope those of you that did read all of my posts have taken something valuable from the experience, and found the topics of debate interesting. I also hope that you have changed your opinion on certain matters, and have a firm grasp on multiculturalism, both as it existed in the past, and now in present day.

We have looked at multiculturalism on a range of different scales, but the same issues seem to arise in every scenario. I talked about multiculturalism in the city of Birmingham, the country of Britain, the continent of Europe, and the superpower of America, but multiculturalism seems to be at the same stage in all of these differing locations. Politicians from all of these regions claim that multiculturalism has failed, as national identity is lost, and social integration is not in effect efficiently.

 Members of the public that are against multiculturalism all seem to have the same reasons for their negativity too, mainly that they are worried about lack of jobs, and that they are afraid to embrace an alien culture. I personally think that any individual should have the right to live in any country on Earth, as long as they are willing to work hard to help that country succeed, and they are willing to respect that country’s culture, as well as holding onto aspects of their own culture.

Governments should put in place better schemes to help smaller communities integrate, so that people do not just stay in an isolated group of people of their own ethnicity. I believe that one day the human race will be one single, vastly varied culture, and we will possibly see the eradication of countries and boundaries. Maybe when people stop caring about the colour of another person’s skin or the ethnic background of an individual, maybe then we can all combine our unique intelligence together, and help humanity progress into a new peaceful age. 

Multiculturalism in the United States of America

         This next post will discuss the role multiculturalism has played in the United States of America since it has been a nation. It could be argued that America is a huge success story for multiculturalism. People from so many different places travelled to America to start a new life when it was a new nation. This means that the people who live their today have a vast range of ancestry.

People from many different European countries and African countries went to live in America. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Census-2000-Data-Top-US-Ancestries-by-County.svg, this diagram shows the main ancestral background in different states of America. It is incredible how much of a variation in different cultures we see here, ranging from English to Eskimo. America has gone on to be a very powerful country in the world, so this early diversity clearly contributed to the nation’s success.

 For most of recent history, America has seen a large settling of Mexicans in their country. Historically, Spain colonised a lot of South America, and they also had a presence in North America, notably Mexico. There is a large amount of Spanish talking people in the southern states of the US, showing that there has always been a Hispanic presence in the country, but is this a bad thing? At the very least, it shows that immigration to America is not a thing of the past, it still happens on a large scale.

Many Americans are against Mexican settling in their country, but is there any real reason for this? http://mexicanmigration.wikia.com/wiki/American_Views_and_Opinions_(Negative), this link explains how Mexicans are discriminated against in America. The website claims that the everyday American believes that Mexican immigrants will take their jobs and change American culture. But these individuals fail to recognise that their own ancestors emigrated from another country, and the country has gone on to thrive as a result. The Mexican population in America provide much needed help with jobs that need to be fulfilled to ensure America’s continued success.

Multiculturalism has always been a part of America’s heritage and success. The fact that the country now has its own identity and culture, shows that people from different backgrounds can integrate together in order to make one bigger united society. Can the rest of the world’s nations take a leaf out of America’s book, and accept the ideals of various different cultures? My prediction is that eventually we will see something similar on a global scale, and we will have a United Nations of the World scenario, where every individual is vastly cultured, and people do not conflict with each other over petty ancestral differences.

Multiculturalism in Europe

         This post will focus on multiculturalism in Europe. Britain is not the only European country with a large amount of immigrants; many of the other powerful countries within Europe have residents from all sorts of ancestral backgrounds.

Germany is a place where multiculturalism has been attempted, but their leader Angela Merkel believes that multiculturalism has failed, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CX-NGfbvJtc . In this speech she says that forcing people from different backgrounds to live together has not worked, and that integration is not happening. Germany is a majority Christian nation, but there is a presence of Hinduism, Judaism and Islam too, with immigrants coming from the likes of Asia and Turkey. Merkel also claims that immigrants need to learn how to speak German if multiculturalism is ever going to work. I agree with this sentiment, the newcomers to a country should not have to lose their own cultural values, but I believe that they should make an effort to learn about their new country’s language and historical background, this is the only way integration will ever happen.

France is another example of a highly diverse country in Europe. A lot of people from northern Africa, and various other parts of Africa migrate to France; this is mainly because these places used to be French colonies. France is a relatively secular country, but there is still a large presence of Catholicism, and a smaller presence of Islam and other countries. These religious differences have caused conflict in parts of France, and ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy had his say on multiculturalism when he was the leader, http://www.cbn.com/cbnnews/world/2011/February/Frances-Sarkozy-Multiculturalism-Has-Failed/. In this speech, Sarkozy mimics other European leaders, by saying that multiculturalism has failed in his country. He says that it only leads to violent extremism, and that the country letting immigrants in will slowly cause France to lose its unique identity.

Sarkozy makes a very valid point, but I believe the only reason these things happen is because we have not yet found an efficient way of incorporating diversity into our nations, is there anything we can do to make integration happen more successfully? I think we need to successfully integrate people together in small societies, through council-based projects. This grass-roots equality should eventually filter out to countries as a whole.

Globalisation, Part 2

         Immigration is another form of globalisation, when families move to a different country they are taking their culture with them. When people are living in communities that contain various cultures, they will learn to live side by side. In the future I intend to move out of Britain and live in another country, mainly because I do not like the British weather, but this means that I am going to live within a different culture, and I will be taking my culture to whichever community I move in to. I am sure I will have many debates with people overseas about politics and religion, but I predict they will be friendly and fun, not hostile.

Not everyone is an advocate of globalisation. This website, http://majorityrights.com/weblog/comments/multiculturalism_as_a_process_of_globalisation/, talks about how multiculturalism is a process of globalisation, but it also talks about how globalisation is bad for the world. The article claims that multiculturalism is only a ploy to get people’s sympathy; globalisation’s real aim is to give the elite power at the top of all governments the ultimate amount of power. It also claims that countries lose their character by becoming more similar to each other, and that globalisation is mainly a result of strategic capitalism, a system that uses individuals unfairly to ensure a maximum profit.

 I think globalisation could be a dangerous thing if it eventually led to a one-world government that happened to be run by an elite few of corrupt people. It is also unethical to use people to gain maximum profit. Some would argue that countries allow immigrants to cross their borders so they can be treated like slaves, to do the hardest manual jobs for little pay. But I think if these things can be avoided, globalisation is ultimately a good thing. There are a lot of selfish and greedy people in the world, so can these bad things realistically be avoided? Times will get worse before they get better, it may lead to more conflict at first, but once the dust has settled and differing cultures have integrated, we may see a completely different civilisation, an improvement on corrupt democracies.

Globalisation, Part 1

         This next post will focus on globalisation, and how it contributes to multiculturalism. In my opinion, globalisation is the process of the world coming ‘closer’ together, in more ways than one. Technology enables an individual to communicate with a person on the opposite side of the planet; this is a form of globalisation. This article, http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2002/oct/31/globalisation.simonjeffery, describes globalisation as being very financial based, saying that the trading between different countries is how we define globalisation. But I personally believe that globalisation is deeper than that, I think that it represents a mixture of cultures, and a brighter future for humanity.

 Social networks are a key part of globalisation, large amounts of people instantly connect to each other via the internet. This enables people from differing religions to come into contact with one another, and have lively debates. The rise of mobile phones has also played a big part, having the ability to talk to anyone anywhere, human beings have limitless connectivity. The media has a huge impact on globalisation too, when we watch the news we get to see what is developing everywhere around the world. The movie and music industry are also influential, films and songs are distributed worldwide, so people get to see another culture on a screen.

People can also afford to have more holidays, when doing this they get to view other cultures. People eating food that belongs to another country’s cuisine is a form of globalisation. In Britain, there are a large amount of restaurants that specialise in Chinese, Indian, Italian and various other cuisines; this is because they are very popular amongst British people. Is it good that the world is now seemingly ‘closer together’, or was it better back in the days when different cultures were isolated from one another? The globe, culturally speaking, is getting smaller at a very fast rate. In my opinion globalisation holds the key for much needed integration to happen globally, this is why we must continue to let globalisation happen.