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With the rapid development of globalization, immigration has become a common trend in modern society. It makes a great impact on numerous areas such as politics, economy, values and employment. Accordingly, multiculturalism has become a controversial issue in this modern era. Some who favor multiculturalism advocates that it influences society positively, while others who hold the opposite view maintain that multiculturalism leads to conflicts such as increasing crime rate, racial tension and lose of identity.
Despite this divide, it is a fact that multiculturalism helps to create a ruinous society. This essay will elucidate this viewpoint by exploring three main areas which are politics and economy and social cohesion. First of all, a significant benefit of multiculturalism is political stability. In multicultural countries, immigration is an important part of population composition. In consideration of immigration’s rights, the government has established policy to keep the social security and stability.
For instance, Barrel and Beets (2001) state that Australian government and educated Australians support the policy of the multiculturalism. Another example is Canada. Canada is the first country’ to present multiculturalism policy. The policy of effective immigration enhances the development of Canada’s society. Squid (2009) claims that Canada has established a specific law to protect and respect the rights of people from different races, religion and languages.
He also adds that the 1 988 Multiculturalism Act presents ‘multiculturalism reflects the cultural and racial diversity of Canadian society and acknowledges the freedom of all members of heritage’ (Squid 2009, p. 1 1). While this is rue, some people argue that multiculturalism has a negative impact on politics. For example, unlike Australian government supports the policy of immigration, Western Europe government refuses to accept immigration due to ‘worries about the ways migrants were allegedly reshaping the social fabric of their society and about related national identity issue’ (Barrel & Beets 2001, pa).
Furthermore, they maintain that recently a series of incidents are allegedly committed by criminal ethnic gangs, and these developments have engaged public scare that multiculturalism are turning Australia into a battery f of communities divided on ethnic lines. Admittedly, this may be so; however, if the government guarantees migrants’ political rights and creates a safe political environment for them, they can feel safe as well as a feeling of belonging, the social unrest element will be reduced.
A typical example is Montreal in Canada, the government has been looking for ways to improve voting system experiencing the multiculturalism (Ruble 2006). It means that the government intends to create the self-improvement and the development of the political system. He also concludes that although multicultural cities have some obvious disadvantage in aspect of politics, the enormous cultural diversity supplies the basis for successful policy for modern society. Therefore, it is clear that political stability can contribute to a harmonious society. The second positive aspect of multiculturalism is economic prosperity. In typical countries of immigrants, such as Australia and Canada, the development of economy is important element to be considered into immigration policy. For example, Australia is rich in resource but sparsely populated. The economic development of Australia requires a large number of talents with special skills, high skill. In addition, it is reported that most immigrations have high-level of education. Consequently, immigration is beneficial to Australia’s development of economy.
Moreover, cultural diversity can inject a different vitality into the development of economy. It is beneficial for the development of economy. Even though this is true, some people may argue that immigration will bring a negative affect to the labor market. DEER ( 2005 ) maintains that immigration has caused high unemployment ate, because it increases the available supply of labor in Australia. McDonald and Withers (2008) also suggests that before the local residents’ work, education, training are ensured, immigration should not continue to be expanded.
However, majority of migrants are investment migrants. They have economic strength to establish a business. It means that the new migrants may create some job opportunities for local people and immigrants. Furthermore, in order to create a better living environment for themselves and their generation, most immigrants would like to work hard and make a economic progress. From these aspects, migrants also can create some job opportunities for new migrants and local people. Evidently, immigration can promote the development of economics.
Another positive impact of multiculturalism is to enhance the social cohesion. A multicultural society, people are encouraged to accept and respect different cultures, ethnics. For example, Barrel and Beets (2001) claim that most Australians would like to to discard prejudice for immigrants’ ethnic background. It means that migrants can have their own cultural heritage, languages and beliefs. Furthermore, they are also encouraged to integrate into the mainstream of society. Another evidence is Canada.
The public policy of immigration encourages different ethnic groups and minorities to maintain their own cultures and identities (Picot & Sweetmeat 201 1). It is not hard to understand that in multicultural society, it is not only requiring local people to accept cultural differences but also forces migrants to blend in the native cultural. On the other hand, some people may against that multiculturalism heighten racial tension and may leads to a national division. For instance, in many multicultural countries, ethnic conflicts happened constantly.
The extremist of race try to wants to separate from the world. Meanwhile, some countries oppose multicultural policies, and enforce new migrants to abandon a part of their cultural heritage and integrate into the local culture (cited in Sampans et al. 2005). It may lead some tension between natives and immigrants. Though this may be true in some cases, sometimes we can avoid the possibility of conflict if migrants and natives respect and understand each other’s cultures. In fact, immigrants who want to join the Australians team are accepted by most Australians (Barrel & Beets 2001).
In addition, they also highlight that Australians encourage migrants to embrace the new culture and integrate within mainstream Australian society. It is a general expectation that multicultural policies reduce tensions between the traditional and the new groups in a society. Furthermore, cultural diversity can help the people to create positive self esteem and greater social unity. Clearly, social cohesion is an important factor to promote the development of harmonious society. The essay has focused on the positive effects of multiculturalism, in term of politics, economy and social cohesion.
In relation to politics, this essay has examination political stability can contribute to create a harmonious society. With regard to economy, it makes clear that multiculturalism can be a stimulant for a country’s economy. In connection with social cohesion, it has revealed that multiculturalism requires people to respect and accept many different cultures, customs and religions. After analysis of the evidence, it is possible to strongly conclude that multiculturalism helps to create a ruinous society.
Finally, in order to boost multiculturalism process in the world, and create a more open and more tolerant society, it should strengthen communication and cooperation between the countries.