Multiculturalism, Interculturalisms and the Majority

Interculturalism, in its two forms, critiques multiculturalism. A European version emphasises cultural encounter and novelty, and is relatively apolitical except for its disavowal of the national in preference for the local and the transnational. In contrast, its Quebecan counterpart gives significance to the idea of the right of a national community to use state power to reproduce itself. Whilst the former is a recognisably cosmopolitan vision I ask if the latter represents a distinctive mode of integration. The core of the article is a textual examination of two recent publications by leading public intellectual scholars in Quebec, Gerard Bouchard and Charles Taylor, respectively, including a lengthy discussion of the former's concept of "majority precedence". I argue that Quebecan interculturalism challenges multiculturalists to offer a positive view of "the majority", which to date they have largely neglected to do, but which is possible within the conceptual and normative resources of multiculturalism.