Trump is complaining that Canadians are “mean and nasty,” according to the US ambassador to Canada. Cultured man that he is, he is echoing an old French saying:
Cet animal est très méchant,
Quand on l'attaque il se défend.
... Subsequent misunderstandings and misrepresentations of Taylor’s essay suggest that it has been wrongfully pressed into ideological service in the long campaign against multiculturalism.
[Cont]
...It argues that the evidence Taylor provides associating multiculturalism with the equality of cultures assertion is weak: his argument that the assertion underpins the 1990s “canon debate,” the only aspect of multiculturalism he addresses, does not withstand scrutiny...
[Cont.]
... Against the widespread view that the essay is an essential, even “canonical,” statement of multicultural theory, this paper argues that the central focus of Taylor’s essay is not multiculturalism, but a broader and loosely defined “politics of recognition.” ...
[Cont.]
... This depiction of multiculturalism has been offered by academics, authors of screeds on the state of the modern world, and even by a Norwegian mass murderer. This paper examines the role of Charles Taylor’s influential “Politics of Recognition” essay in sustaining that depiction...
Society has just published my “Charles Taylor and the ‘equality of cultures’.”
An open view-only copy is available here:
rdcu.be/edlDw
Summary:
Opponents of multiculturalism regularly claim that it is based on a belief that “all cultures are equal.” ...
“And all opposing forces as if vanished from the face of the earth. It is this utter collapse of a power only recently present, no, its complete disappearance (just as in 1918) that I find so staggering.”
Victor Klemperer “I will bear witness” (1933)
A March 4, 2025 reflection:
“Both production and consumption, says Keynes, should take place in the same country if possible, so as to rule out international blackmail.”
Wolfgang Streeck, Taking back control (2024)
The “Literary Review of Canada” has published Andrew Torry’s generous review of my “On the other hand: Canadian multiculturalism and its progressive critics.” It’s available at: reviewcanada.ca/magazine/202...
“Curious: at the very moment modern technology annuls all frontiers and distances (flying, radio, television, economic interdependence), the most extreme nationalism is raging.”
Victor Klemperer "I will bear witness" (1938)
