Europeanisation, National Identities and Migration ... - europeanization

110 Krystyna Romaniszyn
(further) diversification. The analysis does not pretend to completeness as there are
very probably other dimensions of cultural diversification brought about by
the inflows that have not been addressed here and are to be searched for. It rather
promotes the novel subject in the research on migration, and on cultural change
ongoing in the European nation-states, and thus supplements the analysis of the
Europeanisation process set in motion by European integration.
Cultural pluralism – dilemmas with governance
Cultural diversification brought about by international migration reveals itself in
the above-mentioned pluralisation of all spheres of the affected culture, and the
differentiation of the recipient state’s ethnic structure. The latter instance poses
the problem of the management of ethnic pluralism that has become a constant
characteristic of the European receiving nation-states. It shapes the new Europe
along with the progressive consolidation and unification of the European nationstates,
stemming from the European Union enlargement process, further intensified
by the collapse of the Soviet bloc. Thus, the twofold inner cultural diversification
of the European nation-states, resulting from the admission of the newcomers, forms
a context for the opposite process: the Europeanisation.
The permanence of immigrant residence and the development of their ethnic
enclaves call for the implementation of the effective measures promoting the
peaceful co-existence of numerous ethnic minorities within a nation-state. A crucial
issue regarding the management of ethnic, and subsequent cultural, pluralism within
nation-states is summed up in the following questions: to what extent must a national
culture change in order to integrate minorities? What is the status of minorities’
culture, including religion vis-à-vis the dominant culture? Roughly, the debates
on the management of ethnic and cultural pluralism focus either on the interests of
the nation-state and its dominant culture, or on civil society as a remedy to ethnicity.
As one party thinks of protecting, by skilled management, the cultural centre (core)
against the alien cultures, the other calculates on dismantling the nation-state.
The ultimate aim of the former strategy is the full integration of immigrants and
their offspring, who are expected to reconcile their cultural heritage with the dominant
culture. Cultural homogeneity is perceived as the basis for the politically
centralised nation-state. In the latter case, the usually unspoken ideal, matching
the development of a modern liberal creed, seems to be the ‘post-nation’ state. In
both cases, despite the differences between them, ethnic cultures are expected to
adjust to the model of co-existence set by the dominant culture that preserves
dominant status for itself.
A good start to a discussion of this issue is provided by the ideal types of response
to ethnic diversity, set out by Modood (1997: 21ff.). The first two, ‘the decentred
self’ and the ‘liberal state’ solutions offer politically constituted multiculturalism
where individuals relate to the state as citizens, not as members of any groups, ethnic
ones included. Such a state is ‘group-blind, it cannot “see” colour, gender, ethnicity,
religion or even nationality’ which remain private to individuals (ibid.: 22). The
‘republic’ remedy also does not recognise groups and relates to each citizen as an