Monument to Multiculturalism by Francesco Perilli in Toronto, Canada. Four identical sculptures are located in Buffalo City, South Africa; Changchun, China; Sarajevo, Bosnia and Sydney, Australia

Multiculturalism relates to communities containing multiple cultures. The term is used in two broad ways, either descriptively or normatively.^[1] As a descriptive term, it usually refers to the simple fact of cultural diversity: it is generally applied to the demographic make-up of a specific place, sometime at the organizational level, e.g. schools, businesses, neighbourhoods, cities, or nations. As a normative term, it refers to ideologies or policies that promote this diversity or its institutionalisation; in this sense, multiculturalism implies a "positive endorsement, even celebration, of communal diversity, typically based on either the right of different groups to respect and recognition, or to the alleged benefits to the larger society of moral and cultural diversity”.^[2] Such ideologies or policies vary widely, including country to country,^[3] ranging from the advocacy of equal respect to the various cultures in a society, to a policy of promoting the maintenance of cultural diversity, to policies in which people of various ethnic and religious groups are addressed by the authorities as defined by the group they belong to.^[4][5] However, two main different and seemingly inconsistent strategies have developed through different Government policies and strategies:^[6][7]The first focuses on interaction and communication between different cultures. Interactions of cultures provide opportunities for the cultural differences to communicate and interact to create multiculturalism. (Such approaches are also often known as interculturalism.) The second centers on diversity and cultural uniqueness. Cultural isolation can protect the uniqueness of the local culture of a nation or area and also contribute to global cultural diversity.^{[citation needed]} A common aspect of many policies following the second approach is that they avoid presenting any specific ethnic, religious, or cultural community values as central.^[8]

Multiculturalism is often contrasted with the concepts of assimilationism and has been described as a "salad bowl" or "cultural mosaic" rather than a "melting pot."^[9]

Multiculturalism in different national contexts[link]

Monument to Multiculturalism by Francesco Perilli in Sarajevo.

The term multiculturalism is most often used in reference to Western nation-states, which had seemingly achieved a de facto single national identity during the 18th and/or 19th centuries.^[10] Multiculturalism has been official policy in several Western nations since the 1970s, for reasons that varied from country to country,^[11][12][13] including the fact that many of the great cities of the Western world are increasingly made of a mosaic of cultures.^[14]

The Canadian government has often been described as the instigator of multicultural ideology because of its public emphasis on the social importance of immigration.^[15] The Canadian Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism is often refereed to as the origins of modern political awareness of multiculturalism.^[16] In the Western English-speaking countries, multiculturalism as an official national policy started in Canada in 1971, followed by Australia, where it has since been displaced by assimilation, in 1973.^[17] It was quickly adopted as official policy by most member-states of the European Union. Recently, right-of-center governments in several European states—notably the Netherlands and Denmark— have reversed the national policy and returned to an official monoculturalism.^[17] A similar reversal is the subject of debate in the United Kingdom, among others, due to evidence of incipient segregation and anxieties over "home-grown" terrorism.^[18] Several heads-of-state have expressed doubts about the success of multicultural policies: The United Kingdom's Prime Minister David Cameron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Australia's ex-prime minister John Howard, Spanish ex-president Jose Maria Aznar and French President Nicolas Sarkozy have voiced concerns about the effectiveness of their multicultural policies for integrating immigrants.^[19][20]

Many nation-states in Africa, Asia, and the Americas are culturally diverse, and are 'multicultural' in a descriptive sense. In some, communalism is a major political issue. The policies adopted by these states often have parallels with multicultural-ist policies in the Western world, but the historical background is different, and the goal may be a mono-cultural or mono-ethnic nation-building - for instance in the Malaysian government's attempt to create a 'Malaysian race' by 2020.^[21]

Australia[link]

Australian Government poster issued by the Overseas Settlement Office to attract immigrants (1928).

The next country to adopt an official policy of multiculturalism after Canada was Australia, a country with similar immigration situations and similar policies, for example the formation of the Special Broadcasting Service.^[22] The White Australia Policy was quietly dismantled after World War II by various changes to immigration policy, the full political introduction of official policies of multiculturalism was not until 1972.^[23] The election of John Howard's Liberal-National Coalition government in 1996 was a major watershed for Australian multiculturalism. Howard had long been a critic of multiculturalism, releasing his One Australia policy in the late 1980s.^[24] A Practical Reference to Religious Diversity for Operational Police and Emergency Services was a publication of the Australasian Police Multicultural Advisory Bureau designed to offer guidance to police and emergency services personnel on how religious affiliation can affect their contact with the public. The first edition was published in 1999.^[25][26][27] The first edition covered Buddhist, Hindu, Islamic, Jewish and Sikh faiths with participation of representatives of the various religions.^[28] The second edition added Christian, Australian Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander religions and the Bahá'í Faith to the list of religions was published in 2002.^[29]

Argentina[link]

Though not called Multiculturalism as such, the preamble of Argentina's constitution explicitly promotes immigration, and recognizes the individual's multiple citizenship from other countries. Though 97% of Argentina's population self-identify as of European descent^[30][31] to this day a high level of multiculturalism remains a feature of Argentina's culture,^[32] allowing foreign festivals and holidays (e.g. Saint Patrick's Day), supporting all kinds of art or cultural expression from ethnic groups, as well as their diffusion through an important multicultural presence in the media; for instance it is not uncommon to find newspapers^[33] or radio programs in English, German, Italian or French in Argentina.

Canada[link]

Political cartoon on Canada's multicultural identity, from 1911

Canadian society is often depicted as being "very progressive, diverse, and multicultural".^[34] Multiculturalism (a Just Society) was adopted as the official policy of the Canadian government during the premiership of Pierre Elliot Trudeau in the 1970s and 1980s.^[35] Multiculturalism is reflected in the law through the Canadian Multiculturalism Act^[36] and section 27 of the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.^[37] The Broadcasting Act of 1991 asserts the Canadian broadcasting system should reflect the diversity of cultures in the country.^[38][39]