Civitas Blog

A more extensive discussion can be found in Civitas’ recent publication, by Patrick West, The Poverty of Multiculturalism, but it is a form of cultural relativism which states that all cultures are equal, while at the same time saying that British traditions and ways of life should give way to those of ethnic minorities. As Kenan Malik has pointed out, there is a difference between multiculturalism as a lived experience and multiculturalism as an enforced ideology. There is a difference between living alongside people who have different customs and outlooks, and the state forcing us all to retain these differences, using its muscle to do so – through financial aid to ethnic minorities, prioritising foreign festivals and language teaching in state schools, and so on. What in its inception was a tolerant ideal to encourage mutual understanding ends up emphasising difference and acting as an agent of separatism.

The fact that Trevor Phillips is willing to provoke a debate at a time when leftwing pieties and rightwing prejudices need to be examined and tested is to his credit, and to accuse him of giving succour to racists is risible. Yet Jasper says that Phillips’ pronouncements on the subject are ‘counterproductive and generate many of the most unapologetic headlines in the rightwing press’ – presumably he considers his own headline unsensational and conducive to rational thought. Free speech, it seems, is something the multiculturalists will only allow for themselves. No one, other than proper racists, wants homogeneity within the population. No one wants everyone to look and behave identically. Diversity is good, cultural exchange is good. But a society in which people do not share values and language is unstable. As the likes of David Goodhart have stated on a number of occasions, too much diversity jeopardises trust.

Jasper’s next bit of spite is directed at Trevor Phillips for observing that differences between Muslims and other groups in British society have more to do with culture than race. Jasper makes the illogical quantum leap: ‘the truth is that vile anti-Muslim prejudice, using the religion of a community to attempt to sideline and blame it for many of society's ills, is the cutting edge of racism in British society.’ It appears that ‘racist’ is a word you can use to attack people whose views you disagree with – rendering the term almost meaningless in its misprision. Jaspers is also appalled that Trevor Phillips could have stated at the Tory party conference that the British Empire had some upside because, he states, ‘in reality the empire was a system of subjugating hundreds of millions of black and Asian people, justified by a white supremacist ideology.’ This is staggering – and sad. Ignorance often assumes its own certainty, asserts its ‘reality’ as if there were nothing beyond it, and in the process reveals itself to be little more than a prejudice. For all the wrongs of the Empire, it spread democratic process, encouraged international trade and industry, established infrastructures still in place today, etc, etc.

Trevor Phillips deserves respect for saying that we need a robust debate and for being willing to get it going. It is just a pity that the likes of Lee Jasper would rather impose a bourgeois dictatorship of illiberal liberalism. And we’ve not even started on the reasons why multiculturalism is failing millions of ethnic minority British nationals…