Wheat from the Chaff

An Exchange on Multiculturalism

I pulled myself into a discussion of multiculturalism and had a surprisingly civil discussion with another respondent. I say "surprising" because it was in the online discussion forum for Maclean's magazine, a place I normally avoid. [The extremism of the current editorial board has really taken its toll on a once venerable institution.] I suppose I was fascinated with this person's belief that multiculturalism (and especially his rather relativistic notion of it) is the dominant political value in Canadian politics, an increasingly common belief that nevertheless goes against any serious reading of Canadian politics and history.

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[The other person] ... Canada is more influenced by America than any non-Christian groups. Shall we start expelling them?

And just look at what the Internet has done to free expression and the invasion of foreign ideas. I don't think people realize that Muslim's use the Internet. Is it time to start filtering foreign websites?

Are Francophones to be skimmed off? Atheists and agnostics too? Increasing godless Ontario?

As Canadians we can only define our culture by what it is not. We are a country of immigrants that has changed significantly decade-over-decade, generation-over-generation and if you think asking immigrants to accept our culture will stem the tides of change, you are being very naive.

[My first response] I couldn't disagree more. Canada is a liberal democracy, and that entails many substantive traditions and obligations. There are many things that we ARE. The Charter is a good place to start, though by no means the only point of reference. At Canada's core is a moral and legal injunction to respect individual freedom and autonomy. We are also a society that is said to respect the rule of law and equality before the law. Thus, multiculturalism is not the core of Canadianism; indeed, it was an afterthought in the Charter process, and its position in Sec. 27 has a lexical ranking clearly below the individual freedoms and legal entitlements that come in the sections before it.

If newcomers, like both of my parents, can live within these obligations, then there is no problem. If they can't, then Canada is not a place for them. And if we can't ask for newcomers to respect these boundaries, then we are a society for which there is little to defend. And to think this is acceptable is what I think is naive.

[The other person] Fair enough. We can apply some cultural definition through our adaptations of British (and French) basis of law and sense of social contract, but socially speaking we are a society constantly in flux, which is why we went from excommunicating homosexuals from many aspects of society 50 years ago to allowing them to marry today, for example.

You say multiculturalism isn't a core of Canadianism, ranking below individual freedoms and legal entitlements, but I would say that such freedoms and entitlements inevitably lead to multiculturalism by their very nature because it provides in law protection to minority groups from the rule of the majority (J.S. Mill would like it I am sure), resting heavily on the most important word in the Charter; 'reasonable.'

The point I was making was against the rather disgusting bigotry directed towards a group of people who for the overwhelming part meet our societal obligations the best they can, with each generation meeting them better than the one before.

[My second response] I'd argue that Canadian multiculturalism is a fairly recent phenomenon that has its roots in the rise of "identity politics", changing post-war immigration patterns and the struggle by many non-Brits and Francophones (including Ukranian and German Canadians) to battle the arrogance of "biculturalism".

On the other hand, the liberal democratic principles I mentioned earlier have been around much longer, and many scholars argue that the Charter is just an extension and codification of long-held principles and beliefs (much of them inherent in British common law). As such, the changes in recognition that you rightly point out do not represent a fundamental change in our society, but a long overdue and logical extension of the universal promise inherent in liberal democratic societies and constitutions.

I do agree that bigots are never far from view, and often target those who have met or surpassed the "bar". However, bigotry can work both ways. When I see certain Muslim families arrive on an annual basis to register their kids in our public distance ed. school, I am overwhelmed. The mothers (I think) arrive in a full burqa, they walk in the back, and they are mute [and thus moot]. The fathers control the registration. And I almost never see daughters.

It is obscene. It is the worst form of bigotry I can imagine. Unlike head coverings and religious symbols, which do not block interaction, the burqa is a portable wall of separation.

What is worse is that nobody says a word (out loud). I would lose my job if I objected.

And while I'm sure some would argue this is a "choice", I recall those lines from Martin Luther King's "Letter from a Birmingham Jail" - perhaps the best promulgation of Western values in the last 50 years:

... Any law that uplifts human personality is just. Any law that degrades human personality is unjust. All segregation statutes are unjust because segregation distorts the soul and damages the personality. It gives the segregator a false sense of superiority and the segregated a false sense of inferiority. Segregation, to use the terminology of the Jewish philosopher Martin Buber, substitutes an "I it" relationship for an "I thou" relationship and ends up relegating persons to the status of things. Hence segregation is not only politically, economically and sociologically unsound, it is morally wrong and sinful. Paul Tillich has said that sin is separation. Is not segregation an existential expression of man's tragic separation, his awful estrangement, his terrible sinfulness?...

Put up a sign!

I don't normally promote anything written in the The Province, but a recent column by Ethan Baron certainly caught my eye. The scenario he presents, that of the police entering your house to confiscate anti-Olympics signs taped to your window, seems like a fairly plausible proposition. Is it populist fear mongering? Perhaps, but given recent laws proposed by municipalities and the provincial government, I don't feel totally confident that we can trust the municipalities to go after commercial signage only. Moreover, the RCMP seems oblivious to the growing concern over their tactics and Olympic mandate, a mandate that seems to pay more attention to the needs of the IOC than the requirements of Section 2 of the Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Firefighting: A Public Good?

In a 2008 speech for TVO, Naomi Klein discussed the shrinking public sphere in the United States. Already small by Western standards, America's public sphere appears to be shrinking by the week. One of the few realms of American society that is still considered to be a public good is firefighting and disaster relief. But even that is disappearing. AIG Insurance (as well as Chubb Alarm) have set up their own private fire fighting forces to help insurees protect their homes... assuming your house is important enough to save. (For Chubb, that means a market value of at least one million dollars.)

Two stories that explain the trend can be found here and here. Notice that the business website (link 2) paints a substantially rosier picture in its conclusion compared to the Bloomberg article (link 1).

A "public good" can be defined as any item or service that is publically funded and available to all. Moreover, it's good for you if other people also have it. For example, public education is a public good because it's a benefit for you if other people around you are educated. Presumably firefighting is a public good, too, as the protection of all helps protect you as an individual.

The same is not true of a private good. This type of good does not require equal access to a product or service. The fact that others lack what I have (let's say, a Porsche) is not a hindrance to me if they can still move efficiently with public transit, a bicycle or a Kia. Inequality in this case is a matter of reward and preference, rather than mutual benefit.

Canada's ratio of public to private goods is slightly higher than the United States (especially with health care), but less than most western European countries. Even within Canada, Quebec sees child care as more of a public good, while most other provinces do not. BC still views basic auto insurance as a public good ("it's good for me that other people are insured"), while Alberta or Ontario consider it a private good.

What constitutes a public good varies greatly. Each country tends to have a different ratio of public to private goods, but this ratio is a relatively stable predictor of daily politics. In other words, the dominant ideology of any country can be measured by this ratio. It shows how much we (or the political elites, at least) are other-regarding or egoists.

If we are living in an age of increasing political egoism, perhaps those who defend public goods, or seek their expansion, need to emphasize the self-interested nature of public goods (they help you, too). It wouldn't hurt to also emphasize the efficiency of public enterprises when delivering goods we all need, in the sense that private enterprises replicate bureacracies and lead to higher administrative costs, like in the American medical system.

My letter on multiculturalism is used by the Globe and Mail

On Aug. 25th, a short letter I wrote to writer Daniel Stoffman was used at the beginning of his Globe and Mail question and answer session on multiculturalism. In response to his earlier article, I made the simple point that multiculturalism is not as central to the Canadian fabric as some people believe because there are other, more fundamental values at play.

Stoffman's basic thesis is that Canada is not truly multicultural, even if it appears to be a commonly held perspective of politicians and journalists. Stoffman hedges his bets when it comes evaluating his own conclusions, though he does imply that it's probably best for Canada to accept diversity rather than true multiculturalism - which he regards as a rather radical policy if taken to its logical conclusion. I'm not sure I share his rather extreme conception of multiculturalism, but I do agree that we overestimate its importance - however it is conceived - in our political culture.

Neil Boyd ... Criminologist in the Clouds

On August 6th, Neil Boyd, a widely quoted criminologist from SFU, wrote an opinion piece that decried those who criticize him and other academic commentators on the issue of crime. Here's a brief response.

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Neil Boyd, a well known SFU criminologist, seems puzzled that people “don’t like what academics have to say” about crime. I would propose the opposite: Boyd does not like to hear what others think about crime, and that he represents a point of view that most Canadians wholeheartedly reject.

Boyd and many others in his trade take a social scientific view of crime. Criminal behaviour is analyzed with statistics and identifiable trends, and the response to crime is framed by rehabilitation, deterrence and other approaches amenable to measurement. Moreover, these empirical preferences carry a significant normative commitment, to which Boyd appears deeply committed.

But I would posit that the large majority of Canadians don’t see crime in the same way. They see crime, particularly violent crime, as primarily a moral issue, and have a normative commitment clearly at odds with Boyd's professional perspective. Even if there were only one violent crime next year in Canada, the question would remain: did the convicted criminal receive a penalty of reduced entitlements commensurate to the rights he or she took away from his/her victim(s)? This is justice as equity or fairness. Crime in this sense is not conceived as a medicalized problem that must be solved by experts. It does believe that people must be held responsible for their actions, particularly when these actions are so heinous that they violate the basic rights of others. Indeed, it's a view that believes the justice system is as much about the victims of crime as the criminals themselves. It also believes that drugs or alcohol - especially if attached to violent crime - do not automatically provide a get-out-of-jail-for-free card. If one is capable of the mundane tasks of eating, finding some form of shelter and securing drug supplies - all of which require at least a modicum of rationality - then why is such rationality immediately and quite conveniently ignored when it comes to criminal responsibility? Finally, it believes that the criminal justice system ought not be a social working institution. If there are legitimate human needs for social welfare, then why does it appear that the police and the courts are obliged to be primary social working agencies? They lack the requisite resources to accomplish such a lofty goal, with the end result that they do a mediocre job of both policing and social working.

The criminal rights faction usually responds (condescendingly) that this normative perspective is mere retribution, and that it doesn’t solve the problem of crime. Unfortunately, we rarely hear in any extended way why retribution is indeed wrong, except that it is supposedly “uncivilized”. Apparently moral responsibility is barbaric. Moreover, the demand for “solutions” merely restates a rather self-serving standard - the kind of standard that employs a lot of people in the criminal rights industry - that simply ignores the call for moral equivalence.

If Boyd wants to be taken more seriously, perhaps he should talk less of “ad hominem” attacks, and more of a fundamental clash of values. This may take him beyond his comfort zone of statistical analysis, but it might answer his aforementioned puzzlement more honestly.

My Review of Is Multiculturalism Bad for Women?

Susan Moller Okin’s Is Multiculturalism Bad for Women? is a fascinating application of liberal feminist theory to a major issue in western politics. Okin starts with the proposition that many ethnic minorities in multicultural societies do not believe that women are equal to men. This poses a particular problem for those who fight for equality if one of these ethnic minorities seeks constitutional protections under the policies of multiculturalism. Okin maintains that any ethnic minority that demands protective rights must not be granted those rights if it means the subordination of women. It would mean a liberal majority endorsing illiberal practices. Okin asks us to make a choice: if there is direct conflict between women's and minority rights, the former should prevail.

The book is organized in a readable format. It starts with Okin’s original 1999 essay on the topic, a series of responses from fellow academics and writers, and Okin’s rejoinder to their arguments. All of the essays are relatively brief, and there is a good balance between those who support Okin and those who don’t. Most of the essays (though not all) are free of unnecessary academic jargon, and the book in general strikes a good balance between thoroughness and brevity.

Though I generally liked the book, there are some weaknesses. The most obvious to me is Okin’s refusal to say that, in the West at least, some values (especially gender equality) ought to be considered superior to others. She implies this several times, but she never seems to come out directly and say it. In addition, much of her evidence about gender discrimination comes from high profile court cases. I would feel more comfortable with more comprehensive statistical references. Nevertheless, I generally find Okin’s position (and rebuttals) to be very persuasive. Her emphasis on the fluidity and fractures within minority cultures is commendable, and she argues convincingly that young minority women – who are not yet assimilated into discriminatory values – ought to have their autonomy protected. Many of her detractors focus on the illiberality of western societies, and never seem to confront the even greater illiberality in many religions and non-western cultures. They seem to miss that Okin herself uses the promise of liberal universality against those who don’t practice what they preach. Others criticize her for not going far enough to include issues of race and economic inequality. Yet it seems that one essay cannot really be blamed for not discussing all forms of inequality, and Okin’s point of view certainly doesn’t exclude such considerations. Similarly, her argument is really about minority cultures in western societies, and is not a global condemnation of hierarchal cultures. Her critics sometimes go beyond the scope that Okin sets for herself. Finally, many of Okin’s most vehement critics are Muslim men, and the irony of their defensiveness never seems to dawn on them.

On the whole, I would recommend this book for those interested in multiculturalism, equality and the hierarchy of values within open societies.

Language Reveals Power

I've always been a fan of George Carlin. He was one of the first mainstream comedians to use humour against power, and there aren't many comedians who have forced the US Supreme Court to consider laws on speech and obscenity. He was, in my mind, the great link from Lenny Bruce to present-day commentators like Jon Stewart. And Carlin was one of the few celebrities who never seemed to sell his soul... at least not explicitly. (I admit, Shining Time Station was not a highpoint of Carlin's career.) In any case, you have to respect the wisdom of a guy who says, “If God had intended us not to masturbate, he would've made our arms shorter”. A modern day sage, I say.

On the other hand, I recently came across a passage from Carlin where he argues that “by and large, language is a tool for concealing the truth”. I've heard this kind of argument before, and I'm not so sure I can agree.

Is it language that conceals truth? Or is it the forces - economic, political, demographic - that encourage certain speech/text to be produced and venerated, and other speech/text to be censored, ridiculed or ignored? I believe it's the latter. I'm not saying that language is neutral or inert, as if it's a simple mirror that perfectly represents a physical reality. I just believe that language finds it difficult to hide its speaker's or author's intentions. Language just can't help itself. If you know where and how you look, language will eventually reveal its relationship to power - be it domination or submission or defiance. Language is like that friend who just can't keep a secret.

Case in point: the unions versus the bondholders in the ongoing GM debacle.

Have you ever noticed that the corporate press and their followers always couch union activities in moral terms? Thus, if a union like the CAW moves to defend its members' pensions, the language of moral condemnation comes out with clarity and predictability. A good example (though a rather muted one, considering the source) comes from The National Post, Canada's newspaper equivalent to Fox News. In a typical puff piece, the NP recently let Garth Whyte, the executive vice-president of the Canadian Federation of Independent Business, write his own story. Read the article carefully. Whyte tries to be understated, but he just can't seem to help himself. The union's pension is ultimately a "luxury". Whyte, of course, is against any bailout, because it's "overly generous". He taps into the private sector envy of public-sector pensions, and a bailout package that appears to be equivalent, and seems to think that if his RRSP has gone down, so should everyone else's. [This seems to be the favoured sentiment amongst most of the union-haters who have posted on this topic in The National Post and The Globe and Mail.] In other words, union efforts are based on greed. Workers and their representatives are almost always cast as lazy, venal and undeserving. If they cause a company to collapse, it's considered a moral failure. Damn those unions!

The bondholders are another story. These are the investors, by the way, who until recently would not agree to a settlement with GM (unlike the supplicating unions). In many ways, it is the bondholders who are responsible for GM's current move into bankruptcy protection. But no matter. There is no greed here. At worst, their rational self-interest has been a matter of miscalculation. That is, it's not moral at all; it's a matter of business. Moreover, if their efforts are cast in moral terms, it's with a different set of values than the one used against the unions. Rather than a list of vices drawn from the seven deadly sins, the morality of the bondholders is a matter of "conviction" as they struggle against the grasping unions and their government henchmen. So the NP portrays the bondholders as the victims of this tragedy, and reports (without a challenge) the following:

"The latest GM 'offer' sends a chilling message to all individual bondholders, not just those, like us, holding GM bonds: Contracts in America are no longer worth the paper they are written on," said GM Bondholders Unite, a grass-roots group representing individual GM bondholders across the United States.

"The 'offer' to individual GM bond investors is ridiculously lopsided because it arbitrarily favors other groups, at the expense of the legal rights, under the U. S. Constitution, of hundreds of thousands of individual GM bond investors.... We aren't asking for a bailout or a handout, just a fair deal. So we have no plans to back down."

My Review of Neil Bissoondath’s Selling Illusions

Neil Bissoondath’s book, Selling Illusions, offers an unusual argument for a Canadian book, particularly since a non-white immigrant writes it. Selling Illusions opposes Canada’s official, sacred cow policy of multiculturalism. Generally speaking, Bissoondath’s book is a well-written treatise that discusses a potentially dry subject in clear, jargon-free prose. Nevertheless, his arguments suffer from some surprising weaknesses, borne largely from his inability to empathize with the very people he, ironically, accuses of ignorance and lack of empathy.

I found his analysis and critique of multiculturalism effective. Briefly stated, Bissoondath believes we need to focus more on what makes us the same rather than what makes us different. He argues that the federal government’s policy of multiculturalism is one of the main reasons for our current focus on difference rather than unity. Pierre Trudeau’s 1971 Multiculturalism Act, for example, is devoid of what Canadian society actually is. In fact, it also discourages the articulation of a common discourse: “Multiculturalism has made us fearful of defining acceptable boundaries” (p. 143). It fails to deliver on one of its most important goals, that of going beyond tolerance and into what Michael Ignatieff calls “recognition”. Multiculturalism has “preached tolerance rather than encouraging acceptance; and it is leading is into a divisiveness so entrenched that we face a future of multiple solitudes with no central notion to bind us” (p. 192). The implication of his argument is clear. It is important for a country, even a country like Canada, to emphasize what its citizens hold in common. It is important for Canadians to ask themselves what those values actually are. And it must be acceptable to draw lines in the proverbial sand, beyond which tolerance becomes self-defeating.

Ethnicity, however, is not the basis for a common national narrative. Bissoondath is an unbridled cosmopolitan. He believes that ethnicity is – or should be - relatively unimportant. Racial definitions of homogeneity are old-fashioned and will not work in Canada; he believes that we need a new definition of social cohesion based on shared social norms, not skin colour: "Culture, in its essentials, is about human values, and human values are exclusive to no race” (p. 71). He feels no deeply bound allegiance to his own ethnic heritage, and prefers to affiliate with those who share his social and intellectual values. “I feel greater affinity for the work of Timothy Mo – a British novelist born of an English mother and a Chinese father- than I do for that of Salman Rushdie, with whom I share an ethnicity… Ethnically, Mo and I share nothing, but imaginatively we share much” (p. 105). If Canada is to flourish, it must find ways of identifying the values that Bissoondath holds, a non-ethnic set of principles and beliefs that allow Canadians to develop a unifying “civic nationalism”.

My major problems with Bissoondath’s argument are that his cosmopolitanism is, I believe, overly optimistic, and that he accepts such significant exceptions that he degrades the force of his own logic. I personally agree that History must not be an anchor on the present, but I think he’s wrong to conclude that “shared ethnicity guarantees neither fellowship of feeling nor congruity of interest” (p. 132). Are we willing to give up our ethnic identities so easily? I don't believe so. My reading of history simply doesn’t reflect Bissoondath's argument. In times of strife, ethnicity is usually the single major shorthand that’s used to determine common values and loyalty. And in the absence of other, more deeply felt sentiments, I don’t think we can logically argue ethnicity out of our value system. Indeed, cosmopolitanism is historically one of the first victims of the breakdown in social order; its very existence assumes that ethnic differences have been overcome or minimized. So if strife and chaos leads us back to ethnicity, cosmopolitanism is more a tenuous historical circumstance than a unifying force. Bissoondath goes on to say that all his professional success “has come, in great part, through the refusal to brood over the loss of one language and its cultural baggage and a willingness to fully embrace another” (p. 81). This kind of cosmopolitanism seems unrelenting and uncompromising. And when he argues that “ethnicity’s true value [is] as one of the many elements that inform the way the individual views the world” (p. 212), I think he’s simply naïve. Ethnicity is very real. Even those of us who are skeptical of ethnicity can’t will it away. The second major problem I have with the book is Bissoondath’s rather uneven application of his own argument. Bissoondath tries to avoid insulting “Old Canada” and those who wish to keep Christian and European values at the core of our national vision. But eventually he can’t help himself. Those who support the old Reform Party are “ignorant”. For anybody blocking his cosmopolitan vision of the future, Bissoondath has neither tolerance nor recognition. On the other hand, Quebec’s attempt to preserve its own culture is lauded: “It is obvious to anyone with a nodding acquaintance of Quebec that it is different. It has obligations… and if you have special obligations, then you need special powers to fulfill those obligations” (p. 198). Yet those who are opposed to giving group rights to Quebec, because it damages national unity, suffer from a “colonial mentality”.

Bissoondath therefore prefers some forms of unity, but clearly not others. I wonder if most Canadians share his particular definition of the “middle way”.

Michael Ignatieff`s The Rights Revolution: A Review

Here's the first of a series of revamped book reviews that I've published in the past on Chapters.ca and Amazon. They're not meant to be exhaustive, but they have helped me to focus my understanding of the books and my memory of their key ideas. Eventually I will publish most of my older reviews and then add new ones... if I have time to read.

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The Rights Revolution

By Michael Ignatieff

The Rights Revolution is a thought-provoking book, and a praiseworthy attempt to confront the issues of national unity, individual identity and multiculturalism. Nevertheless, it is so riven with contradictions and concessions that it’s sometimes hard to pin down what Michael Ignatieff actually believes.

Ignatieff’s book is an effort to define a conception of civic nationalism based on a theory of human rights. As such, it builds on past books like Blood and Belonging. Ignatieff discusses rights in a particularly Canadian context: his theory of human rights attempts to strike a multicultural balance between group rights and individual rights. Nevertheless, Ignatieff is philosophically a liberal, and in a conflict between the two types of rights, “we should allow individual rights to prevail” (19). Thus, if rights are sought in order to protect the identity of a minority group (e.g. Muslims and Aboriginals), these group rights must not infringe on the rights of its individual members. A “rights culture” accomplishes many things for Ignatieff: rights help articulate and moderate conflict; rights create trust (assuming that both sides respect the rights of the other); rights demand permanent self-questioning; rights help define common meta-values that allow differences to co-exist; right provide a counterbalance to a democratic majority; rights create reciprocities between mutual rights-bearing people; and they defend individual autonomy. Ignatieff therefore places a great deal onto the political centrality of rights, and the discussion of mutual entitlements that they will generate.

One of Ignatieff’s central arguments is that we must go beyond mere tolerance and move towards what he calls “recognition”, which is an “act of enlargement” (136). In such an act, differences should be “acknowledged and welcomed” (87). As long as the majority is also respected, Ignatieff believes that the long term prospect for minority individual rights in Canada is usually towards recognition. For example, in terms of gay rights, he believes their rights will soon be recognized [and were, not long after the publication of this book in 2000]. “Rights equality changes moral culture because groups demand recognition. As they do so, they force sexual majorities toward acceptance and approval… The process will take time and properly should do. But again, it seems hard to imagine that this respect will not follow eventually” (88-89).

There are many frustrating parts in the book. Ignatieff avoids one of the most important questions about rights: where do they come from? From at least Edmund Burke onward, the clash between “inalienable” and “communally derived” rights has been a central debate. But Ignatieff ignores their fundamental distinctions and simply answers that rights come from both sources: “We already possess our rights in two senses: either because our ancestors secured them or because they are inherent in the very idea of being human” (28). And that`s it. He never pursues the essential differences between the two, though he seems to favour “inherent” individual rights. Had he explored the other perspective in greater detail, he might have answered his own question of why liberal “rights talk” ignores social inequality, a collective problem not easily solved by an aggregation of rights-bearing individuals. And had he explored the communitarian view that rights are earned by reciprocation, and ought to be retracted when not advanced equitably, then perhaps he would have seen how individual rights may not be sufficient to create a foundation for a successful polity. By addressing what we are obligated to do for others, in order to help ourselves, Canadians might exhibit greater empathy for others and not simply demand respect for one`s own entitlements. This would certainly broaden the concept of citizenship, and command a greater respect for our country.

Ignatieff contradicts and equivocates to the point of distraction. He starts with the central Canadian perspective that the “essential distinctiveness of Canada itself lies in the fact that we are a tri-national community” (124-125). Then he concedes that “Canadians from [non tri-national] communities refuse to accept the very concept of Canada as a pact between founding races… This concept seems to accord no place to them.” But then concludes, very optimistically, “Most of them can accept that original inhabitants may have claims to territory and language that are withheld from newcomers” (130). The potential for multi-tiered citizenship is never acknowledged or explored. He also believes that the “criticism most often advanced against a civic nationalist vision of national community is that it is too thin. It bases national solidarity on rights equality, but neither rights nor equality make sufficiently deep claims on the loyalties and affections of people to bond them together over time…Clearly, rights are not enough” (126-127). But then he concludes, because of our lack of ethnic unity, “This is essentially why Canada has no choice but to gamble on rights, to found unity on civic nationalist principles” (129). Finally, he argues that the “precondition for order in a liberal society is an act of the imagination: not a moral consensus or shared values”. Then he concedes that “Imagination only carries us only so far…” (138), but flips back and argues that the “entire legitimacy of our institutions depends on our being attentive to difference while treating all as equal. This is the gamble, the unique act of the imagination on which our society rests” (139). By the end, it is difficult to say where Ignatieff actually stands on many key issues. Ignatieff seems skilled at identifying and analyzing problems, but not so skilled (or perhaps willing) to defend a particular solution or point of view. If this is how he acts as a politician, then ``flip-flop``-itis seems to be a much more appropriate criticism by his opponents than his lack of residency.

So, Ignatieff’s book explores some significant issues, but it never provides the clarity and resolution that he thinks “rights talk” offers.

Inequality Makes Us Ill

Inequality makes us ill. And depressed. And violent

Across all the Western democracies, there is a consistent pattern in which outcomes worsen as inequality increases

BY WILL KYMLICKA

A Review of The Spirit Level: Why More Equal Societies Almost Always Do Better, by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett, Allen Lane, 331 pages

http://www.theglobeandmail.com/servlet/story/RTGAM.20090515.wbkspirit16/BNStory/globebooks/home

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Will Kymlicka, a noted Canadian scholar on politics and multiculturalism, has provided a well-written and thought-provoking review of a book by Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett. Their book addresses a topic - inequality - which remains on the fringes of economic and political discussion, even though I believe it's at the center of our current economic malaise.

Kymlicka discusses Wilkinson and Pickett's point that inequality is not just a moral issue. It has real human costs and tangible impacts.

... Once a country reaches a per capita income of around $25,000, there is simply no correlation between levels of national wealth or health spending and levels of health and human development....

...So what explains why some countries do better than others? A growing consensus points to the quality of people's social relationships, whether in the home, the neighbourhood or at work. In some societies, these relationships are toxic, putting health-damaging stresses on individuals. In other societies, these relationships are supportive, helping individuals deal with life's challenges.

However, Wilkinson and Pickett argue that these different factors are all symptoms of a deeper issue — namely, inequality. Among wealthy countries, Norway and Japan do better than the United States or Switzerland because the gap between rich and poor is smaller. Among less affluent countries, Spain and Greece do better than Portugal because they have less inequality.

This is true of rates of infant mortality, illiteracy, obesity, mental illness, incarceration, homicide, drug use and teenage pregnancy (although not, interestingly, of suicide). Similarly, as inequality rises, social trust and social mobility decline while violence increases. This is true not only between Western countries, but also within them. For example, if we compare the 50 states of the United States, these indicators are worse in states with greater inequality....

...The result is an impressive body of evidence, presented in an easily digestible form, which is highly relevant for debates here in Canada. Polls show that most people believe that inequalities have grown too large in recent years, and this book will surely reinforce that sentiment. Many of us feel that the growing level of inequality is unfair, and harmful to a sense of shared citizenship and community cohesion. But as Wilkinson and Pickett show, it is also harmful to our health....

Kymlicka responds that there are many issues that help determine social stability and community health:

[I]t's not just income inequality that matters, but also the nature of the labour market, the stability of people's jobs and housing, the strength of community organizations and so on.

Moreover, there are many sources of status anxieties in modern societies — such as racism or homophobia (or attitudes toward beauty) — that are only indirectly related to income inequalities. So, income inequality seems a very crude measure for the almost infinitely complex array of status hierarchies in our society, and the link between the two is something of a black box in the book.

Kymlicka then concedes that many of these problems, though not a necessary outcome of inequality, usually do arise in unequal societies if other mitigating factors do not appear.

The authors would probably respond that, whatever these complexities, the data show a clear tendency for income inequality to generate worse health outcomes. So for practical policy purposes, we should just focus on inequality.

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So here we have another argument in favour of tackling inequality. It has real and debilitating effects. We are not made stronger by inequality; as a tendency, it retards and constricts, and is a real threat to our belief in the equality of opportunity. Moreover, equality in this sense is a relative concept that bespeaks of our social nature. Unlike the Fraser Institute, which argues that equality should be measured in absolute terms, Richard Wilkinson and Kate Pickett show that social interaction defines equality in relative terms. It's cold comfort, and largely irrelevant, that a poor person in Chilliwack is surviving on the same caloric intake of a person in Haiti. Social trust, social mobility and violence are realities that make sense only in social terms, with the people who live in our own community or nation.