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# Monocultural vs multicultural societies

A number of countries have been experimenting with becoming more multicultural whereas others have preferred to remain more monocultural and homogenous. A monocultural society is one in which everyone adopts the same culture. A multicultural society is composed of multiple distinct cultural groups that each have their own distinct culture.

Heritage is the cultural, historical and material legacy that is passed down from previous generations. Traditions, values, artefacts and historical pieces of infrastructure can all be forms of heritage that are passed down.

Culture is the shared and learned system of meanings, values, norms, symbols and practices that a group uses to understand the world. Culture is something that helps people with organising their lives, it’s transferred down through generations and it also evolves over time.

## **Are preferences for a monocultural or multicultural society fair and reasonable?**

There is nothing morally or ethically wrong with either of these approaches. They are both viable ways that you could structure a society. Different groups may prefer to live in one way or another.

However these choices do have a number of ramifications. People with a different heritage and culture could live together in peace and harmony. But monocultural societies that have a well established and dominant heritage and culture are also welcome to continue living just the way they are. A monocultural nation-state don’t need to invite anyone else into their society if they don’t want to.

## **Monocultural nation-state advantages**

Monocultural societies can help with increasing the likelihood that they are able to maintain a more cohesive society. Less differences in how people approach their way of life can mean there isn’t as much opportunity for conflict over certain differences. Differences that could have become more prominent and potentially replacing existing cultural norms in the society. A monocultural society doesn’t need to worry as much about their culture being replaced by another culture. This could still slowly happen due to changing demographics however monocultural society could be more proactive on preventing those changes from happening.

A shrinking population shouldn’t mean the culture diminishes or that a population is going to be replaced. Having more commonality in culture and norms across a population can speed up decision making as there’s less things to have conflicts over. People could be more aligned on certain topic areas due to the shared heritage and culture.

Maintaining a monocultural society is also useful for the continuation of traditions and cultural norms without much disruption, a monocultural society will generally have a slower and more natural evolution of culture that is influenced by the long-established ancestral group.

## **Monocultural nation-state disadvantages**

The main risks with monocultural societies are around how they handle changes in demographics such as the working age population. If there aren’t enough young and active people in the economy, this could put a strain on supporting a growing percentage of elderly people. But this problem doesn’t need to be solved by giving citizenship to other groups. Instead gaps in the job market could be filled by migrants with temporary visas. Another option is the use of any emerging capabilities from AI and automation. Demographic problems could be potentially solved in a few different ways over the long term rather than creating an environment that can dilute the nations own culture.

Monocultural societies may also lack certain skill sets that could help their nation with achieving more prosperity. It could be faster to bring in talent from elsewhere than it is to educate people at home or to create alternative solutions. Again temporary visas could help with filling these skills gaps when necessary.

## **Multicultural societies advantages**

Multicultural societies can have advantages around filling skill gaps more quickly if you’re more open to inviting in external talent that might come with their own cultural traditions and preferences. This openness can make a society more adaptive to sudden changes as people can more easily fill new positions due to economic and demographic changes. Multicultural societies could result in more languages, arts, cuisines and perspectives which some communities may prefer.

## **Multicultural societies disadvantages**

The risks of multicultural societies are numerous. Rapid change of demographics can decrease social cohesion and trust between people as they become less familiar with one another and the preferences, morals and values of the different groups of people that live in the society. This can make it harder to fund public goods when some groups may exploit things like welfare more than others due to cultural differences.

Groups from different backgrounds can also result in segregation and the creation of separate community enclaves that reinforce their own culture. This can result in the creation of parallel societies. If everyone doesn’t share the same language this can also make communication and cohesion more challenging.

Laws and policies can become more complex as now you need to consider how you cater for different languages, values and preferences and how you’re going to handle anti-discrimination enforcement. You also have concerns around housing and public service capacity, especially if demographics change too fast.

Religious differences and differences in values and belief systems could also mean there are long term differences that cause ongoing disruption and conflict.

Multicultural societies also introduce the possibility that the native and ancestral population is replaced by the people that are introduced to that society. This could mean fully replacing the historical genetics, ancestry, heritage and culture of that society. Genetics, ancestry, heritage and culture are not equal, there can be huge differences, so the long-established ancestral population need to think about whether they’re happy with their own genetics, ancestry, heritage and culture being replaced or not, as this could be possible over the long term.

## **Assimilation assumptions**

A society may decide that it wants to preserve its cultural traditions and norms and it also wants to invite in migrants to join their society. The potential problem with migration is any underlying assumptions that all groups can assimilate into another groups culture.

If another country had a culture that led to more prosperity there would be an argument for other nations to duplicate the most important parts of that culture in their own country. Although this might be logical it is not something you regularly see.

One potential reason is intellectual capacity. Some groups are more intelligent than others and this is influenced by genetics. Culture is downstream from the people that are part of the nation. So in some instances it might be the case that certain groups cannot replicate the culture of another group due to differences in general levels of intelligence.

Another reason is due to the reality of what is required to assimilate into another culture. Properly assimilating into a different way of life can mean fully abandoning the practices and norms that the person grew up with. They might be able to abandon some parts of their culture but to fully strip themselves of their historical identity can be inherently difficult and for a number of people this would not desirable.