Multiculturalism and the theoretical legacy of the nation state

No abstractThe paper explores recent debates on multiculturalism with the aim of (a) explicating certain new approaches to citizenship and the relations between individual and collective rights and (b) addressing the challenge of relativism which is inherent in some of these debates. The paper argues that the debate on multiculturalism represents an opportunity as well as a challenge for political theory. Drawing on recent work in political theory, which seeks to identify the impact of the historical and institutional contexts on the theoretical assumptions of liberalism, the paper considers the possibilities and the limits of ‘interculturai equality’. It defends a form of multicultural political liberalism and adopts a cautious approach to recent works in the tradition of liberal nationalism, which stress the ethical relevance of the national community. Multicultural liberalism remains committed to the universality of human rights while also respecting the particularities of cultural characteristics and the ability of diverse cultures to enhance positive freedom by offering possibilities for fulfilment and self-realization