12. the Nature of Canadian Identity in the Context of Multiculturalism
Total Page：16
File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb
PETER R. GRANT AND DANIEL W. ROBERTSON 12. THE NATURE OF CANADIAN IDENTITY IN THE CONTEXT OF MULTICULTURALISM A Social Psychological Perspective In his classic book, the historian W. L. Morton (1972) argues that Canadian identity is shaped by a unique confluence of social forces over time. First, at the 1926 Imperial Conference of British Empire leaders, the Balfour Declaration made all Commonwealth countries, including Canada, independent sovereign states united through their allegiance to the crown. In Canada, then, government has been developed by peaceful means through traditions and conventions which have gradually evolved over time, and to be Canadian is to support social order and good government. There is, however, no one Canadian way of life, but rather a unity created through allegiance to the British monarchy. Indeed, Morton argues, this type of unity permits “a thousand diversities” (p. 111). That is, in Canada, the national identity is civic rather than ethnic in character (see also Cook, 1994). To be Canadian is to be part of a northern culture which, traditionally, has an economy based upon the development of Canada’s great natural resources. Further, Canada has survived as a nation state through its dependency on the United Kingdom and then, following the Second World War, through its dependency on the United States. The relationship with the United States is especially problematic because American investors usually seek to own Canadian businesses imposing an economic form of colonization. Essentially then, the Canadian government is constantly striving to have a “special relationship” with the most powerful country in the world while resisting encroachments on Canadian sovereignty as well as cultural assimilation. Morton (1972) argues that these circumstances mean that, collectively, Canadians have always had to be concerned with survival both physically and politically, and, in particular, they wish to make Canada flourish as a society that is distinct from the United States. During the Quiet Revolution, which began in the 1960’s under the political leadership of Jean Lesage, Quebec society underwent large scale socio-political change and became increasingly secularized. In particular, the nationalist movement in Quebec focused attention on the growing aspirations of French Canadians. Not only did they feel that their language and culture were increasingly being threatened, but also that Quebec was disadvantaged and marginalized economically within North America. Further, French Canadians felt that English Canadians were indifferent © KONINKLIJKE BRILL NV, LEIDEN, 2018 | DOI 10.1163/9789004376083_012 P. R. GRANT & D. W. ROBERTSON to their concerns (the two solitudes). The Liberal government, under Pierre Elliot Trudeau, sought to re-engage French-Canadians politically by characterizing Canada as a cultural union of two language groups as well as a political union of ten provinces and by passing the Official Languages Act of 1969. Shortly thereafter, the Liberals introduced their multiculturalism policy which characterized Canada as having “a concept of a nationality made up of a mosaic of peoples and a plurality of cultures” (Morton, 1972, p. 147) within a bilingual framework. Morton argues that this both recognized the fact that Canadian society was becoming increasingly culturally diverse while resisting cultural assimilation of Canada by the Americans. Indeed, he argued that “Canada stood or fell with the success or failure of the mosaic” (p. 147). Interestingly, Section 3(1b) of the Canadian Multiculturalism Act (http://laws-lois.justice.gc.ca) states that the policy of the Canadian government is to “recognize and promote the understanding that multiculturalism is a fundamental characteristic of the Canadian heritage and identity and that it provides an invaluable resource in the shaping of Canada’s future” (emphasis added). That is, the policy was designed partly to reflect, and perhaps shape, the way Canada’s citizens define themselves as Canadian. More generally, sub-section 3(1) of the act cites ten policy directions which emphasize that multiculturalism means recognition of Canada’s cultural diversity, support for the full civic participation of Canadians from every cultural and religious background in society and their equal treatment under the law, and the support of cultural heritage groups and the preservation of their heritage languages. Then section 3(2) details the duties and obligations of all Federal government institutions to uphold these policies. Hence, in Canada, to support multiculturalism is to support cultural and religious diversity, to protect human rights, and to oppose discrimination against cultural minorities and immigrants (Berry, 1984; Berry & Kalin, 2000; Grant & Robertson, 2014). Interestingly, many developed countries around the world have introduced multiculturalism policies for these same reasons (Moghaddam, 2008; Verkuyten, 2005a, 2009). It is not surprising, therefore, that members of cultural minorities in these countries hold more positive attitudes toward multiculturalism than members of the majority group who often support assimilation more strongly than multiculturalism. Canada, however, is the exception because attitudes toward multiculturalism are generally positive within the Canadian population as a whole (Berry & Kalin, 1995; Verkuyten, 2006). In the field of social psychology, when we say that individuals identify with a group, we are saying that they define themselves in terms of their group membership. Further, because people can and do identify with many different groups, these identities form an important part of their sense of self called the collective self- concept (Hogg & Abrams, 1988; Luhtanen & Crocker, 1992; Tajfel, 1978). For many people, then, their national identity is a valued part of their self-concept. In the rest of this chapter, we review the social psychological literature on the measurement of group identity-in-general and national identity-in-particular from this perspective with an emphasis on scales used to measure Canadian identity. We describe our research program which was concerned with developing a multidimensional 230.