These feminist Marxist and anti-racist essays speak to important political issues. Though they begin from experiences of non-white people living in Canada, they provide a critical theoretical perspective capable of exploring similar issues in other western and also third world countries. This reading of 'difference' includes but extends beyond the cultural and the discursive into political economy, state, and ideology. It cuts through conventional paradigms of current debates on multiculturalism. In particular, these essays take up the notion of 'Canada' - as the nation and the state - as an unsettled ground of contested hegemonies. They particularly draw attention to how the state of Canada is an unfinished one, and how the discourse of culture helps it to advance the legitimation claim which is needed by any state, especially one arising in a colonial context, with unsolved nationality problems. The myth of the 'two founding peoples', anglos and francophones, has always conveniently ignored the reality of First Nations. who may have a history of being indentured and politically marginalised and only begin struggling for political enfranchisement in their new homeland.

First published in 1998, this volume emerged in the light of the resurgence of militant nationalism and racism since liberalism’s alleged triumph in 1989. We have to ask whether liberalism represents a bulwark against these deformations, or whether it is in fact their harbinger. Central themes explored in this interdisciplinary collection are: ¢ the position of the Romani, especially in central and eastern Europe ¢ the nature and scope of multiculturalism and its relation to conceptions of recognition ¢ the relations of liberalism to nationalism and racism ¢ the philosophical relation of ’the individual’ to national and other identities ¢ the debate between liberal and communitarian conceptions of personhood The book will thus be of particular interest to social and political scientists, philosophers and educationalists, as well as to anyone more generally concerned with contemporary issues of nationalism and racism.

This collection makes available in one e-book most of my key writings on multiculturalism, nationalism and racism in Australia. It includes my two books White Nation and Against Paranoid Nationalism. Tessa Morris-Suzuki has been kind enough to allow me to use her introduction to the Japanese translation of White Nation as a general introduction to the whole collection. I think it works well at introducing new and younger readers of WN and APN to the context in which the two books appeared; a case of the past being another country. I trust the works that make up the collection will be useful, at least to the many people who have been requesting that I make them available especially for teaching purposes. This is particularly so in the case of White Nation, since it has run out of print and that Pluto Press, Australia, the original publisher, has ceased publishing.

Drawing on a wide range of examples, the selections included examine theories of nationalism and consider issues of ethnic integration and conflict in the USA, China, Britain, Germany, Quebec, Scotland, Galicia, Catalonia, Kurdistan, Iran, Iraq and Somaliland among other countries and regions. The reader, however, does not confine itself to the study of nationalism. Many of the selections deal with the role of ethnicity in groups which are not nationalist at all but for which ethnicity is an important factor in the process of migration. The concept of ethnicity is therefore discussed both in relation to group rights in existing nation states and in relation to transnational communities in a globalized world.

Philosophers and social theorists of color examine how racism can creep into defensive forms of nationalism.

Racism is a world problem. From Morocco to China, Brazil to Indonesia, racism is being debated and contested. Multiracism broadens the horizon on this global challenge, showing that racism has a diverse history with multiple roots and routes. Drawing on examples of racism from across the globe, with particular focus on cases from Asia and Africa, Alastair Bonnett rethinks the origins of racism and the connections between racism and modernity. Arguing that plural modernities are interwoven with plural racisms, he explores the relationship of racism to history, religion, politics, and nationalism, as well as to anti-Black prejudice and discourses of whiteness. Empirically rich, with numerous in-depth case studies, Multiracism equips readers to understand racism in a multipolar world where power is no longer the sole possession of the West. It provides and provokes a new, international, and post-Western vision of racism for the twenty-first century.

In Racism and Cultural Studies E. San Juan Jr. offers a historical-materialist critique of practices in multiculturalism and cultural studies. Rejecting contemporary theories of inclusion as affirmations of the capitalist status quo, San Juan envisions a future of politically equal and economically empowered citizens through the democratization of power and the socialization of property. Calling U.S. nationalism the new “opium of the masses,” he argues that U.S. nationalism is where racist ideas and practices are formed, refined, and reproduced as common sense and consensus. Individual chapters engage the themes of ethnicity versus racism, gender inequality, sexuality, and the politics of identity configured with the discourse of postcoloniality and postmodernism. Questions of institutional racism, social justice, democratization, and international power relations between the center and the periphery are explored and analyzed. San Juan fashions a critique of dominant disciplinary approaches in the humanities and social sciences and contends that “the racism question” functions as a catalyst and point of departure for cultural critiques based on a radical democratic vision. He also asks urgent questions regarding globalization and the future of socialist transformation of “third world” peoples and others who face oppression. As one of the most notable cultural theorists in the United States today, San Juan presents a provocative challenge to the academy and other disciplinary institutions. His intervention will surely compel the attention of all engaged in intellectual exchanges where race/ethnicity serves as an urgent focus of concern.