Multiculturalism at the millennium

Journal of Canadian Studies, Spring 2000 by Enoch Padolsky

This article reviews the current state of the Canadian discourse about multiculturalism and looks at some issues that may soon become salient. The essay begins with an overview of the origins of policies on multiculturalism, outlines the general shape of research, writing and public discussion on the issue, and then looks in greater detail at four topic areas that might be said to constitute recurring and central sites of contestation: Unity and Diversity: the National Perspective; Symbols or Rights: Minority Perspectives on Multiculturalism; Multiculturalism and Quebec Politics; Theorizing Canadian Pluralism. The essay concludes by raising a series of questions that are likely to have increasing importance: the implications of growing "racial" diversity; internal minority relations; the place of Aboriginal peoples; the possible impact of Quebec separation.

Since the declaration of a Canadian multicultural policy in 1971, it has become customary, some might even say excessively routine, to review the state of the policy, the health of the concept and the nature of Canada's multicultural reality, at every opportune scholarly occasion. Examples that come to mind include Jean Burnet's "stock-taking" in 1978; the First Decade review by the Journal of Canadian Studies in 1982; the "20-year" volume edited by Stella Hryniuk in 1992; the assessment of multiculturalism in the 1990s edited by Satzewich, also in 1992; Berry and Laponce's edition of group research in 1994 and so on. This article joins these overviews, using the excuse of the millennium as its occasion. No doubt the year 2001 - the 30-year mark for Canadian multiculturalism - will elicit a further flurry.

The recurring desire to take stock of the state of Canadian multiculturalism testifies to the continuing salience of social and cultural diversity in Canadian social discourse. Born in the immediate aftermath of a decade of turbulent change in Quebec - the Quiet Revolution, the FLQ bombs, the new territorially based Quebecois nationalism and the federal gesture of the Bilingualism and Biculturalism Commission (established in 1963) as a response - multiculturalism came into being as a result of ethnic and racial minority Canadians' dissatisfaction with the B & B Commission's original terms of reference (Equality Now! 3). For these minority critics, the establishment of an official bilingual and bicultural framework threatened to cast Canada's other ethnic and racial groups into the permanent role of second-class citizens. These fears grew directly out of the experiences of Canadian minority groups for over a century: immigration policies based on an ethnic/racial pecking order; assimilationist and Anglo-conformist institutional practices (including language suppression); the Komagata Maru incident; the Chinese Head Tax and Exclusion Act; lack of voting rights for some groups; the Japanese-Canadian wartime internment; the rejection of Jewish refugees from Nazi Europe; and a host of other Canadian practices that reflected dominant interests or systemic discrimination.

The 1960s saw the beginning of the end - at least this was the hope - of such grievances and the international context suggested that change was now possible. The Second World War had discredited racist theories, decolonization was accelerating in Africa and Asia, and civil rights, Black Power and an "ethnic revival" were sweeping the United States. The time had clearly come not just for a rethinking of British-Canadian and French-Canadian relations, but for more general recognition of the cultural contributions of other Canadian ethnic and racial groups along with a new assault on the now documented social inequality of Canada's "vertical mosaic" (Porter, The Vertical Mosaic 1965). At the same time, it was also clear that some new arrangement had to be worked out for Canada's Aboriginal peoples, pushed to the side, at least for the moment, in the bilingual and multicultural discussion.

The declaration in the House of Commons of a policy of multiculturalism within a bilingual framework by Prime Minister Trudeau on 8 October 1971, thus can rightly be said to look both backwards and forwards. Closely tied to past experiences as well as contemporary disputes, it promised to form part of the answer to an improved reworking of Canada's internal social relations for all groups. At the same time, it set off a non-stop discussion of the nature, merits and consequences of pluralism (as opposed to dualism) as a newly recognized political factor in Canadian identity and society.

The Multicultural Discourse

Because of the salience of the issues, the discussion of multiculturalism in Canada has always had both popular and scholarly dimensions. Like discussions of bilingualism or English-French relations, therefore, it has frequently carried hot political significance, reflected in the considerable media interest in the issues. Newspaper articles and series on issues of immigration and multiculturalism have appeared regularly and television inquiries such as those on the CBC's Prime Time News (29-30 September 1994) have not been unusual; political debates in federal and provincial legislatures on issues related to multiculturalism (immigration, refugee policy, discrimination, etc.) have become routine. Though all four parties in the House welcomed the initial declaration of a bilingual and multicultural policy (see Canada, House of Commons, Debates), at present two federal parties (Reform and Bloc Quebecois) reject it (see Abu-Laban and Stasiulis; Cardozo and Musto).