Community and Cosmopolitanism: Western Traditions and the Challenges of Diversity

The increase of cultural diversity in Sweden is reflective of the diversifying effects of globalisation throughout western society. The subject is currently widely debated in policy forums, the media and other public spaces, and within political science as part of the resurgence of normative theory. This thesis outlines, compares and analyses the communitarian and cosmopolitan perspectives on diversity, as reflections of and challenges to the traditional western context of modernity, nationalism, individualism and liberal democracy. The theoretical and concrete developments toward postmodernity offer additional dimensions to the current societal development. The purpose of the essay is to create a theoretical framework for observation of diversity issues in the contemporary western reality, using educational literature on political perspectives and normative literature on relevant approaches to the issues surrounding cultural diversity. Examples from newspaper articles, regarding the case of the muslim minority facing the majority culture in southern Sweden, provides an empirical illustration of some of the dynamics explored in the analysis