As cross-cultural migration increases democratic states face a particular
challenge: how to grant equal rights and dignity to individuals while
recognizing cultural distinctiveness. In response to the greater number of
ethnic and religious minority groups, state policies seem to focus on managing
cultural differences through planned pluralism. This book explores the dilemmas,
paradoxes, and conflicts that emerge when differences are managed within this
conceptual framework. After a critical investigation of the perceived logic of
identity, indicative of Western nation-states and at the root of their
pluralistic intentions, the author takes issue with both universalist notions of
equality and cultural relativist notions of distinctiveness. However, without
identity is it possible