The Integration of Immigrant Minorities, Social Citizenship and Cultural Differences. Radicalisation and Conflict in the Light of Frustrated Expectations

Abstract

In my previous work I had argued that a multicultural society could under certain conditions be peaceful, being both acceptable to a modern nation state and serving the needs of its members. The sort of modern nation state which I had in mind was that described by T. H. Marshall based upon legal political and social equality, leading to the replacement of class identity with the identity of citizenship. Marshall, however, had not discussed the position of immigrants and ethnic minorities and I sought to show that it was possible for a modern society to both recognize cultural diversity while at the same time insisting on equality of opportunity for all. I set out some of the problems of simultaneously recognizing these two sets of institutions or cultural domains.
In recent times in Britain the possibility of such a peaceful situation being maintained has been called into question. In recent disturbances between Asian and native British working class people in Northern cities there has been violence with both of these groups engaged in violent conflicts and rioting, posing a problem of security for the police and the political authorities. My analysis based upon the work of Marshall and the policies advocated by Roy Jenkins has been replaced by a new theoretical vocabulary which speaks of the danger of segregation in housing and schooling and the conflict between social cohesion within groups and community cohesion across groups. In these circumstances the very idea of multiculturalism has been called into question and the problem facing British society has been seen as one of security. This was true in relation to both economic migrants and asylum seekers. The British model of multiculturalism has given way to something far more like the French ideal of assimilation now but this is now focussed on the question of state security rather than equal rights. I suggest that this state if affairs results from the failure to develop an adequate concept of social citizenship and the possibility of equal treatment. It is in these circumstances that the problem of potential ethnic violence has become to major issue in policy development.