ABSTRACT
Multiculturalism is more than just a set of abstract philosophical principles, it also manifests itself in a broad range of policies adopted by governments in response to the facts of diversity within their borders. 1 Indeed, much of the earlier work in multicultural political philosophy can be seen as an exercise in seeking normative justifications for multicultural policies and programs that had already been implemented by different countries around the world (see e.g. Kymlicka 1995: 127; Pieterse 2007). A number of these countries, including Australia, Canada and Sweden, are officially multicultural, while others such as Holland, New Zealand and the United Kingdom are not officially multicultural but have nevertheless implemented certain multicultural policies. Even a country like the United States, which tends to portray itself as a great cultural melting pot, has adopted a suite of policies whose flavor is decidedly multicultural (Huntington 2004; Hero and Preuhs 2006). The objective of this chapter is to provide the reader with a basic introduction to what these sorts of policies look like, the kinds of issues they are intended to address, and some of the different ways in which they can be justified.
