ABSTRACT
The dominant public, political and policy discourses that have emerged in the context of the 'multicultural drift' explored in this book have been uncertain and contested. This chapter discusses the broad directions of policy interventions for the governance of cultural difference. It considers the relationship between urban environments and social policy approaches. The chapter then examines the ways in which place and the informal resources and capacities of their residents influence and are sometimes inventively harnessed by local policy networks and actors even as national policy discourse becomes increasingly abstracted through the dominance of the crisis-integration social order discourse. There is a growing, if not always clearly articulated, and widely shared policy understanding at local level that fostering dialogue and making space for encounter is an important aspect of enabling people to live together across difference, seeking to foster the 'organic' and informal.
