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Multiculturalism and National Identity in Diverse Liberal Democracies
6 June - 28 June 2024
Biography
Dr. Clayton Chin is Senior Lecturer in Political Theory in the School of Social and Political Sciences at the University of Melbourne. His past research focused on the methodology of different traditions within political theory, particularly the relation between pragmatist political thought and the analytical and Continental approaches. This research, focused on methodological debates in political theory, led to a variety of journal articles, and a monograph The Practice of Political Theory: Rorty and Continental Thought (Columbia University Press).
Dr Chin’s current work focuses on issues related to multiculturalism and cultural diversity in contemporary liberal democracies, particularly the relation between multiculturalism and national identity in both contemporary Western liberal democracies and theoretical debates. He focuses on the theorising the concept of belonging, and its implication for our understanding of multiculturalism, national identity and recognition. He has published articles on these issues in Ethnicities, Nations and Nationalism, The Journal of Intercultural Studies and Ethnic and Racial Studies.
Dr Chin’s overall research, and specific proposal for this fellowship, significantly overlaps with Prof Modood’s, the proposed UofB Academic Host. Prof. Modood’s work spans both several disciplines (sociology, public policy, political theory) and issue areas (multiculturalism, secularism, racism, national identity, etc). This work specifically relates to his focus on the politics of national identity, and its relation to multiculturalism.
Project Summary
This project focuses on a significant topic in contemporary political culture: the politics of multiculturalism and national identity. Many Western states are experiencing new iterations of nationalist politics that reject immigration and cultural diversity. Given the dangers of these nationalisms, it is vital to understand the relationship between multicultural diversity and national unity. In particular, it is important to understand and assess paradigmatic attempts to link the cultural diversity resulting from immigration to national identity. Such “multicultural nationalisms” can illustrate a different way of representing national identity by placing diversity at the centre of a more inclusive national identity. The literature, to date, on multiculturalism has only begun to examine the possible relation between diversity, unity and national identity. In nationalism studies, multiculturalism still tends to be understood to undermine, rather than transform, national identity.
This project develops a defensible theory of multicultural nationalism, stemming from the applicant’s work on belonging, as the basis for larger empirical and comparative studies of multicultural nationalism: national identities that have incorporated diversity into their symbols and imaginaries of political community. The core work of this visiting fellowship will be developing this theory of multicultural belonging, an account of the nature of group membership across social and political identities in Western diverse democratic states. The complex nature of these connection is both the primary challenge, but also main enabling condition, for multiculturalising the identities of political communities. Political currents today are urging questions about the more symbolic relations of unity that link minorities and majority communities.
Dates, times and venues of Dr Chin's lectures and seminars will be posted on the Events page in due course, in the meantime please contact Dr Chin's host, Professor Tariq Modood, for further information.
