The least you can do is explain what the difference between "there are ethnic cultures" and "If you walk around New York City, for example, you will see many different groups of people, and if they're from New York, they're "New Yawkers," and they are so regardless of what nationality they are" are.
... The difference between identifying as an ethnicity and identifying as being part of a city is that one of them has to do with ethnicity and the other has to do with a city. It's pretty self-explanatory to me, so I'm not sure where the trouble you're having is stemming from.
Simply put- I do not believe that ethnicity means anything as far as culture is concerned. I rent a room from a Korean landlady. Her sons were born in the U.S., don't speak a lick of Korean, and as far as I can tell possess not a single cultural trait that would help identify them as a Korean. They're Americans through and through.
I do firmly believe that nations have a lot to do with culture, in that a similar culture shared by a group of people is what ultimately leads to a sense of nationhood.
This is why I don't quite know how to define a multi-cultural society.
Let's go back to my Korean landlady and her sons. From what I understand, her sons would be defined in the U.S. census as ethnic Koreans, since both their parents are ethnic Koreans. Yet drop them off in Korea and they'd most definitely have no idea how to fit in.
Ok, here's the issue: they're ethnically Korean in the sense of ancestry, but they have no connection to Korean culture. Which goes back to what I said, there are ethnic cultures.
Ethnicity is actually quite complex, and not purely based on ancestry. The Wikipedia article says: "An ethnic group or ethnicity is a category of people who identify with each other based on similarities, such as common ancestral, language, social, cultural or national experiences."
This is why I don't quite know how to define a multi-cultural society.
Let's go back to my Korean landlady and her sons. From what I understand, her sons would be defined in the U.S. census as ethnic Koreans, since both their parents are ethnic Koreans. Yet drop them off in Korea and they'd most definitely have no idea how to fit in.
This is why I find a definition of a multi-cultural society that goes something like "A society where various ethnic groups reside together" simplistic.
I don't define culture purely in terms of ethnicity (heck, I believe that ethnicity/race on its own has absolutely nothing to do with your cultural beliefs), nor do I believe that culture is some fixed thing that doesn't change.
I also believe that cultural beliefs can clash with one another.
Now that these are out of the way, hopefully you can see my questions and the topic I want to get at without the assumption that I may be xenophobic.
I need to clarify: I'm not accusing you of being xenophobic, nor do I believe you are, I'm merely saying that in your attempts to respond or explore the opinions of extremists, you may have gotten caught up in a false dichotomy that they espouse without necessarily realizing it.
As I said, inherent to the question of whether X group of people can belong in Y country without cultural clash is the risk that one may get roped into the idea that ethnicity is the only source of culture.
This is, of course, what white nationalists or other nationalists who do not seek racial intermingling wish to promote: the idea that a country's identity is intrinsically linked to a particular race, and no other race can be a part of this national identity any more than they can be part of another race, because the two are not separate but one and the same.
But this ignores what is blatantly obvious to anyone who's been in any place in, say, America which contains more than one ethnicity. If you walk around New York City, for example, you will see many different groups of people, and if they're from New York, they're "New Yawkers," and they are so regardless of what nationality they are.
This is an important nuance, because it makes it clear that one need not subscribe to only one culture, and that cultures within a society can be a Venn diagram. That is to say, a society's identity (on any level, village, town, city, state, country) can be separate and distinct from the culture of any of the ethnic groups inhabiting it.
Another pitfall to watch out for, in the same vein, is the erroneous assumption that all people of a particular ethnicity or demographic subscribe to the same culture. I've touched on this above. It is from this mentality that you get presumptions like all Muslims are the same and possess the same beliefs. This is, of course, laughable, as to even say that all Shia or Sunni Muslims believe the same thing is ridiculous, to say nothing of the differences and, at times bitter and bloody, conflicts between the two.
It means there's more than one culture that makes up the society, usually in the form of more than one ethnic group.
And I'm not trying to be a smartass by just posting the obvious dictionary definition of the term, but instead putting that there because based on that question, that's really the only answer I can give because that's the only thing I know for certain. Everything else can't be decided in the abstract. It needs to be looked at in a specific context.
That's why I specifically brought up Saudi Arabia and Germany- two countries who social/cultural values seem rather far apart from one another.
I very much doubt that I can find anyone on this board who will defend the rationale behind social/cultural values in Saudi Arabia against those in Germany.
Depends on what values system.
And, If that's the case, does it make sense to have Saudi Arabians who immigrated to Germany continue believing in their social/cultural values as opposed to having them learn and accept German social values?
Depends on what they are.
How far along does this integration go before it ceases to be a multi-cultural society?
Well we can't discuss it in the abstract, but here's the important nuance that we have to maintain:
No country has fixed values, and the reason people adhere to values is not, "That's just how they are."
Belief in freedom and liberty is not a white person trait, nor a Western trait. Belief in religious persecution or a theocracy is not a Middle Eastern trait or a Muslim trait. To treat it as such would be to be buying into the mindset of the right extremists.
I think you're absolutely right. The rationale behind the cultural value/practice matters a lot. If the rationale doesn't some cultural belief held by Saudis don't hold up against scrutiny, then why should it be allowed in Germany?
My question then is- what are you left with?
Whatever's left.
I know what you're asking, but the question behind that question is: what is Germany? What is the German identity? Is it tied to a particular group of people, or can it be something else? Can immigrants to Germany still be German, even if their ethnic heritage isn't indigenous to that particular land?
Again I strongly caution not to inadvertently get caught up in the mindset, and most particularly the false dichotomies, of the right-wing isolationists. Because there seems to be, at least by my reading, an implication in your questions that you might not be aware of: that culture is purely based on ethnicity, and as such, two or more different ethnicities cannot share a culture.
The ultimate point of The Guardian piece above seems to be that today's right-wing European politicians are saying that the attempt to create a global society is a failure, and that further attempts to do so will cause the end of Liberal, Western civilization as we know it.
Which is hilarious, considering that they're fundamentally opposed to Liberalism.
I wouldn't go that far, but I would be willing to argue that the creation of a true global society would mean a DEPARTURE from Western civilization (or would it actually be that there's no such thing as a divide between Western civilization and everything else. It's simply an antiquated view of the world and the liberal ideologies and societies in, say, Germany, is the only correct ideal. The ideals of a country like Saudi Arabia is extremely backwards and doesn't have a place in the world anymore?). Anything else would be an assimilation of the minority cultures into the broader scheme of Western civilization, but that doesn't seem to be an actual global society to me.
Except you're not talking into account WHY.
WHY are these a culture's values? What is the rational basis behind them?
If you don't take that into account, then yes, it will all seem arbitrary. But it's not. It just seems arbitrary to you because you're ignoring the reasons behind it, not because there aren't reasons. We don't just prize liberal values of freedom, liberty, and equality because of the latitude and longitude of our birthplace, or because of the pigment of our skin. There are rational reasons for it.
For instance, obviously it's not a global society if you prize racial homogeneousness among your populace, right? Well, that brings us into liberalism. The idea of a society based on all men being treated equally is a liberal idea.
Ok, here's the issue: they're ethnically Korean in the sense of ancestry, but they have no connection to Korean culture. Which goes back to what I said, there are ethnic cultures.
Ethnicity is actually quite complex, and not purely based on ancestry. The Wikipedia article says: "An ethnic group or ethnicity is a category of people who identify with each other based on similarities, such as common ancestral, language, social, cultural or national experiences."
As I said, inherent to the question of whether X group of people can belong in Y country without cultural clash is the risk that one may get roped into the idea that ethnicity is the only source of culture.
This is, of course, what white nationalists or other nationalists who do not seek racial intermingling wish to promote: the idea that a country's identity is intrinsically linked to a particular race, and no other race can be a part of this national identity any more than they can be part of another race, because the two are not separate but one and the same.
But this ignores what is blatantly obvious to anyone who's been in any place in, say, America which contains more than one ethnicity. If you walk around New York City, for example, you will see many different groups of people, and if they're from New York, they're "New Yawkers," and they are so regardless of what nationality they are.
This is an important nuance, because it makes it clear that one need not subscribe to only one culture, and that cultures within a society can be a Venn diagram. That is to say, a society's identity (on any level, village, town, city, state, country) can be separate and distinct from the culture of any of the ethnic groups inhabiting it.
Another pitfall to watch out for, in the same vein, is the erroneous assumption that all people of a particular ethnicity or demographic subscribe to the same culture. I've touched on this above. It is from this mentality that you get presumptions like all Muslims are the same and possess the same beliefs. This is, of course, laughable, as to even say that all Shia or Sunni Muslims believe the same thing is ridiculous, to say nothing of the differences and, at times bitter and bloody, conflicts between the two.
It means there's more than one culture that makes up the society, usually in the form of more than one ethnic group.
And I'm not trying to be a smartass by just posting the obvious dictionary definition of the term, but instead putting that there because based on that question, that's really the only answer I can give because that's the only thing I know for certain. Everything else can't be decided in the abstract. It needs to be looked at in a specific context.
Depends on what they are.
Well we can't discuss it in the abstract, but here's the important nuance that we have to maintain:
No country has fixed values, and the reason people adhere to values is not, "That's just how they are."
Belief in freedom and liberty is not a white person trait, nor a Western trait. Belief in religious persecution or a theocracy is not a Middle Eastern trait or a Muslim trait. To treat it as such would be to be buying into the mindset of the right extremists.
Whatever's left.
I know what you're asking, but the question behind that question is: what is Germany? What is the German identity? Is it tied to a particular group of people, or can it be something else? Can immigrants to Germany still be German, even if their ethnic heritage isn't indigenous to that particular land?
Again I strongly caution not to inadvertently get caught up in the mindset, and most particularly the false dichotomies, of the right-wing isolationists. Because there seems to be, at least by my reading, an implication in your questions that you might not be aware of: that culture is purely based on ethnicity, and as such, two or more different ethnicities cannot share a culture.
Which is, of course, untrue.
Except you're not talking into account WHY.
WHY are these a culture's values? What is the rational basis behind them?
If you don't take that into account, then yes, it will all seem arbitrary. But it's not. It just seems arbitrary to you because you're ignoring the reasons behind it, not because there aren't reasons. We don't just prize liberal values of freedom, liberty, and equality because of the latitude and longitude of our birthplace, or because of the pigment of our skin. There are rational reasons for it.
For instance, obviously it's not a global society if you prize racial homogeneousness among your populace, right? Well, that brings us into liberalism. The idea of a society based on all men being treated equally is a liberal idea.