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31
I would like to take up the first of these “strategies” since it is the full-blooded liberal vision in its confrontation with multiculturalism that brings to the fore the intractable differences between the two views. Although John Rawls and Ronald Dworkin are held to be the leading liberal theorists, it is Brian Barry’s version of liberalism that multiculturalists react to most strongly. It is also of interest that Barry is as critical of Kymlicka as he is of Parekh and others. He is uncompromising in his defense of liberal egalitarianism and is, in that sense, the true heir of the Enlightenment.
In Culture and Equality (2001), Brian Barry mounts in a devastating critique of multiculturalism and the politics of difference. One of his main aims is to challenge the core assumption made by multiculturalists (on his view), that identical treatment of equal citizens under an Enlightenment-model constitution is to be contrasted with equitable treatment. Barry believes that the anti-universalism of the multiculturalists is essentially reactionary in nature and not dissimilar to the Counter-Enlightenment.
[T]he anti-liberal rhetoric of multiculturalists is not uncongenial to the reactionary right. Thus, exponents of the ‘politics of difference’ typically inveigh against the ‘abstract universalism’ that they attribute to liberalism. . . . Ethnic groups, it has been said, are seen by multiculturalists as ‘self-evident, quasi-biological collectives of a reified “culture’’. All this fits in very nicely with the essentialism of the Counter-Enlightenment, encapsulated in de Maistre’s well-known remark that he had seen Frenchmen, Italians and Russians, and so on, ‘as for man, I declare I have never in my life met him; if he exists, he is unknown to me.” (Barry, 11)
Object Description
| Title | Negotiating pluralism and tribalism in liberal democratic societies |
| Author | Sadagopan, Shoba |
| Author email | sadagopa@usc.edu; shobasadagopan@gmail.com |
| Degree | Doctor of Philosophy |
| Document type | Dissertation |
| Degree program | Philosophy |
| School | College of Letters, Arts and Sciences |
| Date defended/completed | 2008-08-22 |
| Date submitted | 2008 |
| Restricted until | Unrestricted |
| Date published | 2008-10-15 |
| Advisor (committee chair) | Lloyd, Sharon |
| Advisor (committee member) |
Dreher, John Keating, Gregory |
| Abstract | My aim in this dissertation is to enquire whether toleration as a practice is achievable. It is prior to the question of how it can be grounded as a virtue. I argue that in liberal democratic societies where there are struggles for recognition on the part of ethnocultural groups, it is possible to negotiate pluralism and tribalism in a way that a stable pluralist society can be maintained. My core thesis rests on a theory of interdependence based both on a theory of human nature and on the material fact of globalization. Insofar as we affirm our nature as human beings engaged in productive activity with other human beings, insofar as we value a world that facilitates that activity, toleration is desirable. It is achievable because with globalization there is a tendency towards homogenization that erodes cultural differences. There is less reason for conflict because what we have in common, our interdependence, goes far deeper than culture. A further sufficient condition may be found in well thought-out policies that are executed through education and dialogue. |
| Keyword | toleration; value pluralism; liberalism; cultural homogenization; globalization; common citizenship |
| Language | English |
| Part of collection | University of Southern California dissertations and theses |
| Publisher (of the original version) | University of Southern California |
| Place of publication (of the original version) | Los Angeles, California |
| Publisher (of the digital version) | University of Southern California. Libraries |
| Provenance | Electronically uploaded by the author |
| Type | texts |
| Legacy record ID | usctheses-m1658 |
| Contributing entity | University of Southern California |
| Rights | Sadagopan, Shoba |
| Repository name | Libraries, University of Southern California |
| Repository address | Los Angeles, California |
| Repository email | cisadmin@lib.usc.edu |
| Filename | etd-Sadagopan-2395 |
| Archival file | uscthesesreloadpub_Volume26/etd-Sadagopan-2395.pdf |
Description
| Title | Page 34 |
| Contributing entity | University of Southern California |
| Repository email | cisadmin@lib.usc.edu |
| Full text | 31 I would like to take up the first of these “strategies” since it is the full-blooded liberal vision in its confrontation with multiculturalism that brings to the fore the intractable differences between the two views. Although John Rawls and Ronald Dworkin are held to be the leading liberal theorists, it is Brian Barry’s version of liberalism that multiculturalists react to most strongly. It is also of interest that Barry is as critical of Kymlicka as he is of Parekh and others. He is uncompromising in his defense of liberal egalitarianism and is, in that sense, the true heir of the Enlightenment. In Culture and Equality (2001), Brian Barry mounts in a devastating critique of multiculturalism and the politics of difference. One of his main aims is to challenge the core assumption made by multiculturalists (on his view), that identical treatment of equal citizens under an Enlightenment-model constitution is to be contrasted with equitable treatment. Barry believes that the anti-universalism of the multiculturalists is essentially reactionary in nature and not dissimilar to the Counter-Enlightenment. [T]he anti-liberal rhetoric of multiculturalists is not uncongenial to the reactionary right. Thus, exponents of the ‘politics of difference’ typically inveigh against the ‘abstract universalism’ that they attribute to liberalism. . . . Ethnic groups, it has been said, are seen by multiculturalists as ‘self-evident, quasi-biological collectives of a reified “culture’’. All this fits in very nicely with the essentialism of the Counter-Enlightenment, encapsulated in de Maistre’s well-known remark that he had seen Frenchmen, Italians and Russians, and so on, ‘as for man, I declare I have never in my life met him; if he exists, he is unknown to me.” (Barry, 11) |
