Multicultural citizenship reconciles universal rights with minority particularistic claims

Evidence

Cultural heterogeneity constitutes a real test of the strength of citizenship rights. Modern citizenship emerged in societies which saw themselves as profoundly monocultural. It rested on a universalist ideal according to which all citizens were granted the same rights and duties. Nowadays, most societies are de facto multicultural. Ethnocultural and national minorities often make specific claims (recognition, autonomy, special treatment, etc.). Minority claims have for a long time been considered to be incompatible with modern citizenship precisely because they were considered to be particularistic as opposed to universalist and because they were asking for collective as opposed to individual rights. Attempts to reconcile universalism and particularism, individual rights and collective rights, in a renewed conception of citizenship have been developed by political theorists and sociologists who have introduced the notion of multicultural citizenship (Castles, 1994; Kymlicka, 1995). — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 830

Categorization

• DEFINE: Lays out how ‘multicultural citizenship’ emerged as a response to the perceived incompatibility of universalist individual rights and particularistic collective claims.
• XREF: connects to: The abstract universality of rights discourse enables its expansion to excluded groups — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 228; Anticolonialists defended universal rights against cultural-difference exceptions — Jessica Whyte, The Morals of the Market: Human Rights…, 271; Liberal universal citizenship can leave excluded identity intact beneath its surface — David Theo Goldberg, The Threat of Race: Reflections on…, 1620 (+2 more)