ABSTRACT
In this chapter, the author examines one of the most prominent policy arenas in which he have seen the concept of multiculturalism deployed: the debate over "political correctness" within the American public school system. The political economy in which educational arenas are structured and maintained, in turn, has a profound effect on how they will "perform in the process of creating "good citizens." Any attempt to revitalize public education must be linked with a comprehensive agenda for urban revitalization and economic empowerment for the parents of public school children. An urban revitalization agenda that will truly bring life into the public schools will have to be one in which development initiatives are conceived and deployed from the grassroots up, putting indigenous ownership of businesses and property squarely at the center of discussion. Public education has been the centerpiece of American and European democracies since their ideological inception in the Enlightenment Age.
