Multicultural Identity

1724 Words7 Pages
If we understand the nation as an imagined, limited and sovereign entity , it appears that members of nations are less and less longer justified in feeling a form of belonging to a specific nation. With globalization, people tend to recognize themselves less and less in the nation of the state they are citizens of, tend to live their life in a more and more global environment in which the nation-state is losing sovereignty to supranational and international institutions and companies. This has consequences for the way citizens build their identity and relate to the nation. Immigration has led in western countries to the emergence of a phenomenon that has consequences for the nation. It seems that cultural differences are being developed regardless…show more content…
Some citizens of nation-states do not feel as belonging to the nation of their state and use as a language for education and employment English in its “neutralized” form. And even if this is a tendency that is evident for the moment only in countries that are traditionally multicultural, such as Belgium, in others countries as well it seems that citizens do not have legitimate grounds anymore to have a “national sentiment”. For example, until the first part of the 20th century, French and German citizens had to feel respectively French or German, they were thrown into wars that compelled them to feel that way. But with the emergence of free markets in Europe, of the Schengen area (which though undermined nowadays still represents a huge achievement for peace in Europe) and more generally of the European Union, feeling French or feeling German does not make much sense. Once nations are not required anymore, it seems that they are falling apart and that the common unity of the nation is disappearing. If we look again at the example of France, the identity that French people think they have is the product of decennia’s of education that led to build the concept of “being French”, but two centuries ago, people on the French territory were more attached to their local entity, they did not even all speak…show more content…
It seems to be the case that French people and Belgian people are getting more attached to their respective countries when it is being threatened. More broadly, the rise of nationalist political parties in Europe is showing a tendency of citizens to be afraid of foreigners and to want to get back to their national sovereignty. However, I believe this tendency should be nuanced since other indicators show precisely that nationalism is diminishing: the Vlaams Belang (the Flemish nationalist party) lost in the last elections nine seats in the federal chamber and 15 in the Flemish Parliament; the demonstrations organized against refugees in different Flemish cities are always countered by “solidarity with the refugee” marches; and as for the national love shown after terrorist attacks, it is not only shared by fellow countrymen but by millions of people everywhere as the respectively blue, white and red and black, yellow and red flags shared on social media in November 2015 and March 2016 show. It seems thus that while a part of the population might indeed be desirous of “more nation” and less globalization, another part of it is on the contrary willing more borderless solidarity. While both constitute responses to the changes of the world that cause citizens to struggle to find their identity and moral values, I believe that the nationalist option

More about Multicultural Identity

Open Document