Philosophy
Philosophy is the study of general and fundamental questions about existence, values, reason and language. Such questions are posed as problems to be studied or resolved; the term was coined by Pythagoras. Philosophical methods include questioning, critical discussion, rational argument, systematic presentation. Classic philosophical questions include: Is it possible to know anything and to prove it? What is most real? Philosophers pose more practical and concrete questions such as: Is there a best way to live? Is it better to be just or unjust? Do humans have free will? "philosophy" encompassed any body of knowledge. From the time of Ancient Greek philosopher Aristotle to the 19th century, "natural philosophy" encompassed astronomy and physics. For example, Newton's 1687 Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy became classified as a book of physics. In the 19th century, the growth of modern research universities led academic philosophy and other disciplines to professionalize and specialize.
In the modern era, some investigations that were traditionally part of philosophy became separate academic disciplines, including psychology, sociology and economics. Other investigations related to art, politics, or other pursuits remained part of philosophy. For example, is beauty objective or subjective? Are there many scientific methods or just one? Is political utopia a hopeful dream or hopeless fantasy? Major sub-fields of academic philosophy include metaphysics, ethics, political philosophy and philosophy of science. Traditionally, the term "philosophy" referred to any body of knowledge. In this sense, philosophy is related to religion, natural science and politics. Newton's 1687 Mathematical Principles of Natural Philosophy is classified in the 2000s as a book of physics. In the first part of the first book of his Academics, Cicero introduced the division of philosophy into logic and ethics. Metaphysical philosophy was the study of existence, God, logic and other abstract objects; this division has changed.
Natural philosophy has split into the various natural sciences astronomy, chemistry and cosmology. Moral philosophy still includes value theory. Metaphysical philosophy has birthed formal sciences such as logic and philosophy of science, but still includes epistemology and others. Many philosophical debates that began in ancient times are still debated today. Colin McGinn and others claim. Chalmers and others, by contrast, see progress in philosophy similar to that in science, while Talbot Brewer argued that "progress" is the wrong standard by which to judge philosophical activity. In one general sense, philosophy is associated with wisdom, intellectual culture and a search for knowledge. In that sense, all cultures and literate societies ask philosophical questions such as "how are we to live" and "what is the nature of reality". A broad and impartial conception of philosophy finds a reasoned inquiry into such matters as reality and life in all world civilizations. Western philosophy is the philosophical tradition of the Western world and dates to Pre-Socratic thinkers who were active in Ancient Greece in the 6th century BCE such as Thales and Pythagoras who practiced a "love of wisdom" and were termed physiologoi.
Socrates was a influential philosopher, who insisted that he possessed no wisdom but was a pursuer of wisdom. Western philosophy can be divided into three eras: Ancient, Medieval philosophy, Modern philosophy; the Ancient era was dominated by Greek philosophical schools which arose out of the various pupils of Socrates, such as Plato, who founded the Platonic Academy and his student Aristotle, founding the Peripatetic school, who were both influential in Western tradition. Other traditions include Cynicism, Greek Skepticism and Epicureanism. Important topics covered by the Greeks included metaphysics, the nature of the well-lived life, the possibility of knowledge and the nature of reason. With the rise of the Roman empire, Greek philosophy was increasingly discussed in Latin by Romans such as Cicero and Seneca. Medieval philosophy is the period following the fall of the Western Roman Empire and was dominated by the ris
Motivation
Motivation is the reason for people's actions and goals. Motivation is derived from the word motive in the English language, defined as a need that requires satisfaction; these needs could be wants or desires that are acquired through influence of culture, lifestyle, etc. or innate. Motivation is one's direction to behaviour, or what causes a person to want to repeat a behaviour, a set of force that acts behind the motives. An individual's motivation may be inspired by others or events or it may come from within the individual. Motivation has been considered as one of the most important reasons that inspires a person to move forward in life. Motivation results from the interaction of both unconscious factors. Mastering motivation to allow sustained and deliberate practice is central to high levels of achievement e.g. in the worlds of elite sport, medicine or music. Motivation as a desire to perform an action is defined as having two parts, directional such as directed towards a positive stimulus or away from a negative one, as well as the activated "seeking phase" and consummatory "liking phase".
This type of motivation has neurobiological roots in the basal ganglia, mesolimbic, dopaminergic pathways. Activated "seeking" behaviour, such as loco-motor activity, is influenced by dopaminergic drugs, microdialysis experiments reveal that dopamine is released during the anticipation of a reward; the "wanting behaviour" associated with a rewarding stimulus can be increased by microinjections of dopamine and dopaminergic drugs in the dorsorostral nucleus accumbens and posterior ventral palladum. Opioid injections in this area produce pleasure, however outside of these hedonic hotspots they create an increased desire. Furthermore, depletion or inhibition of dopamine in neurons of the nucleus accumbens decreases appetitive but not consummatory behaviour. Dopamine is further implicated in motivation as administration of amphetamine increased the break point in a progressive ratio self-reinforcement schedule; that is, subjects were willing to go to greater lengths to obtain a reward. Motivation can be conceived of as a cycle in which thoughts influence behaviours, drive performance affects thoughts, the cycle begins again.
Each stage of the cycle is composed of many dimensions including attitudes, intentions and withdrawal which can all affect the motivation that an individual experiences. Most psychological theories hold that motivation exists purely within the individual, but socio-cultural theories express motivation as an outcome of participation in actions and activities within the cultural context of social groups; the natural system assumes that people have higher order needs, which contrasts with the rational theory that suggests people dislike work and only respond to rewards and punishment. According to McGregor's Theory Y, human behaviour is based on satisfying a hierarchy of needs: physiological, social and self-fulfillment. Physiological needs are most important level; these fundamental requirements include food, rest and exercise. After physiological needs are satisfied, employees can focus on safety needs, which include “protection against danger, deprivation.” However, if management makes arbitrary or biased employment decisions an employee's safety needs are unfulfilled.
The next set of needs is social, which refers to the desire for acceptance, reciprocal friendships and love. As such, the natural system of management assumes. Accordingly, if an employee's social needs are unmet he will act disobediently. There are two types of the second-highest order of needs; the first type refers to one's self-esteem, which encompasses self-confidence, achievement and knowledge. The second type of needs deals with reputation, status and respect from colleagues. Egoistic needs are much more difficult to satisfy; the highest order of needs is for self-fulfillment, including recognition of one's full potential, areas for self-improvement, the opportunity for creativity. This differs from the rational system, which assumes that people prefer routine and security to creativity. Unlike the rational management system, which assumes that humans don’t care about these higher order needs, the natural system is based on these needs as a means for motivation; the author of the reductionist motivation model is Sigmund Freud.
According to the model, physiological needs raise tension, thereby forcing an individual to seek an outlet by satisfying those needs Ziegler, Daniel. Personality Theories: Basic Assumptions and Applications. To manage and motivate employees, the natural system posits that being part of a group is necessary; because of structural changes in social order, the workplace is more fluid and adaptive according to Mayo. As a result, individual employees have lost their sense of stability and security, which can be provided by a membership in a group. However, if teams continuously change within jobs employees feel anxious and irrational and become harder to work with; the innate desire for lasting human association and management “is not related to single workers, but always to working groups.” In groups, employees will self-manage and form relevant customs and traditions. Humans are motivated by additional factors besides wage incentives. Unlike the rational theory of motivation, people are not driven toward economic interests per the natural system.
For instance, the straight piecework system pays employees based on each unit of their output. Based on studies such as the Bank Wiring Observation R
Culture
Culture is the social behavior and norms found in human societies. Culture is considered a central concept in anthropology, encompassing the range of phenomena that are transmitted through social learning in human societies. Cultural universals are found in all human societies; the concept of material culture covers the physical expressions of culture, such as technology and art, whereas the immaterial aspects of culture such as principles of social organization, philosophy and science comprise the intangible cultural heritage of a society. In the humanities, one sense of culture as an attribute of the individual has been the degree to which they have cultivated a particular level of sophistication in the arts, education, or manners; the level of cultural sophistication has sometimes been seen to distinguish civilizations from less complex societies. Such hierarchical perspectives on culture are found in class-based distinctions between a high culture of the social elite and a low culture, popular culture, or folk culture of the lower classes, distinguished by the stratified access to cultural capital.
In common parlance, culture is used to refer to the symbolic markers used by ethnic groups to distinguish themselves visibly from each other such as body modification, clothing or jewelry. Mass culture refers to the mass-produced and mass mediated forms of consumer culture that emerged in the 20th century; some schools of philosophy, such as Marxism and critical theory, have argued that culture is used politically as a tool of the elites to manipulate the lower classes and create a false consciousness, such perspectives are common in the discipline of cultural studies. In the wider social sciences, the theoretical perspective of cultural materialism holds that human symbolic culture arises from the material conditions of human life, as humans create the conditions for physical survival, that the basis of culture is found in evolved biological dispositions; when used as a count noun, a "culture" is the set of customs and values of a society or community, such as an ethnic group or nation. Culture is the set of knowledge acquired over time.
In this sense, multiculturalism values the peaceful coexistence and mutual respect between different cultures inhabiting the same planet. Sometimes "culture" is used to describe specific practices within a subgroup of a society, a subculture, or a counterculture. Within cultural anthropology, the ideology and analytical stance of cultural relativism holds that cultures cannot be objectively ranked or evaluated because any evaluation is situated within the value system of a given culture; the modern term "culture" is based on a term used by the Ancient Roman orator Cicero in his Tusculanae Disputationes, where he wrote of a cultivation of the soul or "cultura animi," using an agricultural metaphor for the development of a philosophical soul, understood teleologically as the highest possible ideal for human development. Samuel Pufendorf took over this metaphor in a modern context, meaning something similar, but no longer assuming that philosophy was man's natural perfection, his use, that of many writers after him, "refers to all the ways in which human beings overcome their original barbarism, through artifice, become human."In 1986, philosopher Edward S.
Casey wrote, "The word culture meant'place tilled' in Middle English, the same word goes back to Latin colere,'to inhabit, care for, worship' and cultus,'A cult a religious one.' To be cultural, to have a culture, is to inhabit a place sufficiently intensive to cultivate it—to be responsible for it, to respond to it, to attend to it caringly." Culture described by Richard Velkley:... meant the cultivation of the soul or mind, acquires most of its modern meaning in the writings of the 18th-century German thinkers, who were on various levels developing Rousseau's criticism of "modern liberalism and Enlightenment". Thus a contrast between "culture" and "civilization" is implied in these authors when not expressed as such. In the words of anthropologist E. B. Tylor, it is "that complex whole which includes knowledge, art, law and any other capabilities and habits acquired by man as a member of society." Alternatively, in a contemporary variant, "Culture is defined as a social domain that emphasizes the practices and material expressions, over time, express the continuities and discontinuities of social meaning of a life held in common.
The Cambridge English Dictionary states that culture is "the way of life the general customs and beliefs, of a particular group of people at a particular time." Terror management theory posits that culture is a series of activities and worldviews that provide humans with the basis for perceiving themselves as "person of worth within the world of meaning"—raising themselves above the physical aspects of existence, in order to deny the animal insignificance and death that Homo sapiens became aware of when they acquired a larger brain. The word is used in a general sense as the evolved ability to categorize and represent experiences with symbols and to act imaginatively and creatively; this ability arose with the evolution of behavioral modernity in humans around 50,000 years ago, is thought to be unique to humans, although some other species have demonstrated similar, though much less complex, abilities for social learning. It is used to denote the co
Ideology
An ideology is a collection of normative beliefs and values that an individual or group holds for other than purely epistemic reasons. The term is used to describe a system of ideas and ideals which forms the basis of economic or political theory and policy. In political science it is used in a descriptive sense to refer to political belief systems. In social science there are many political ideologies; the term was coined by Antoine Destutt de Tracy, a French Enlightenment aristocrat and philosopher, who conceived it in 1796 as the "science of ideas" during the French Reign of Terror by trying to develop a rational system of ideas to oppose the irrational impulses of the mob. However, in contemporary philosophy it is narrower in scope than that original concept, or the ideas expressed in broad concepts such as worldview, The Imaginary and in ontology. In the sense defined by French Marxist philosopher Louis Althusser, ideology is "the imagined existence of things as it relates to the real conditions of existence".
The term "ideology" was born during the Reign of Terror of French Revolution, acquired several other meanings thereafter. The word, the system of ideas associated with it, was coined by Antoine Destutt de Tracy in 1796, while he was in prison pending trial during the Terror; the word was created by assembling the words idea, from Greek ἰδέα and -logy, from -λογία. He devised the term for a "science of ideas" he hoped would form a secure foundation for the moral and political sciences, he based the word on two things: 1) sensations people experience as they interact with the material world. He conceived "Ideology" as a liberal philosophy that would defend individual liberty, free markets, constitutional limits on state power, he argues that among these aspects ideology is the most generic term, because the science of ideas contains the study of their expression and deduction. The coup that overthrew Maximilien Robespierre allowed Tracy to pursue his work. Tracy reacted to the terroristic phase of the revolution by trying to work out a rational system of ideas to oppose the irrational mob impulses that had nearly destroyed him.
Napoleon Bonaparte came to view'Ideology' a term of abuse, which he hurled against his liberal foes in Tracy's Institut National. According to Karl Mannheim's historical reconstruction of the shifts in the meaning of ideology, the modern meaning of the word was born when Napoleon used it to describe his opponents as "the ideologues". Karl Marx used it in his writings. Tracy's major book, The Elements of Ideology, was soon translated into the major languages of Europe, in the next generation, when post-Napoleonic governments adopted a reactionary stance, influenced the Italian and Russian thinkers who had begun to describe themselves as "liberals" and who attempted to reignite revolutionary activity in the early 1820s. In the century after Tracy, the term ideology moved back and forth between positive and negative connotations; the term "ideology" has dropped some of its pejorative sting, has become a neutral term in the analysis of differing political opinions and views of social groups. While Karl Marx situated the term within class struggle and domination, others believed it was a necessary part of institutional functioning and social integration.
During considerable analysis of different ideological patterns, some have described the analysis as meta-ideology. Recent analysis tends to posit that ideology is a coherent system of ideas that rely on a few basic assumptions about reality that may or may not have any factual basis. Through this system, ideas become coherent repeated patterns through the subjective ongoing choices that people make; these ideas serve as the seed. Believers in ideology range from passive acceptance through fervent advocacy to true belief. According to most recent analysis, ideologies are neither right nor wrong. Definitions, such as by Manfred Steger and Paul James emphasize both the issue of patterning and contingent claims to truth: Ideologies are patterned clusters of normatively imbued ideas and concepts, including particular representations of power relations; these conceptual maps help people navigate the complexity of their political universe and carry claims to social truth. The works of George Walford and Harold Walsby, done under the heading of systematic ideology, are attempts to explore the relationships between ideology and social systems.
Charles Blattberg offers an account that distinguishes political ideologies from political philosophies. David W. Minar describes six different ways the word "ideology" has been used: As a collection of certain ideas with certain kinds of content norma
Tradition
A tradition is a belief or behavior passed down within a group or society with symbolic meaning or special significance with origins in the past. Common examples include holidays or impractical but meaningful clothes, but the idea has been applied to social norms such as greetings. Traditions can persist and evolve for thousands of years—the word tradition itself derives from the Latin tradere meaning to transmit, to hand over, to give for safekeeping. While it is assumed that traditions have ancient history, many traditions have been invented on purpose, whether that be political or cultural, over short periods of time. Various academic disciplines use the word in a variety of ways; the phrase "according to tradition", or "by tradition" means that whatever information follows is known only by oral tradition, but is not supported by physical documentation, by a physical artifact, or other quality evidence. Tradition is used to indicate the quality of a piece of information being discussed. For example, "According to tradition, Homer was born on Chios, but many other locales have claimed him as theirs."
This tradition may never be disproven. In another example, "King Arthur, by tradition a true British king, has inspired many well loved stories." Whether they are documented fact or not does not decrease their value as cultural history and literature. Traditions are a subject of study in several academic fields in social sciences such as anthropology and biology; the concept of tradition, as the notion of holding on to a previous time, is found in political and philosophical discourse. For example, it is the basis of the political concept of traditionalism, strands of many world religions including traditional Catholicism. In artistic contexts, tradition is used to decide the correct display of an art form. For example, in the performance of traditional genres, adherence to guidelines dictating how an art form should be composed are given greater importance than the performer's own preferences. A number of factors can exacerbate the loss of tradition, including industrialization and the assimilation or marginalization of specific cultural groups.
In response to this, tradition-preservation attempts have now been started in many countries around the world, focusing on aspects such as traditional languages. Tradition is contrasted with the goal of modernity and should be differentiated from customs, laws, routines and similar concepts; the English word tradition comes from the noun from the verb tradere. According to Anthony Giddens and others, the modern meaning of tradition evolved during the Enlightenment period, in opposition to modernity and progress; as with many other generic terms, there are many definitions of tradition. The concept includes a number of interrelated ideas. Tradition can refer to beliefs or customs that are Prehistoric, with lost or arcane origins, existing from time immemorial. Traditions were passed orally, without the need for a writing system. Tools to aid this process include poetic devices such as alliteration; the stories thus preserved are referred to as tradition, or as part of an oral tradition. Such traditions, are presumed to have originated at some point.
Traditions are presumed to be ancient and important, though they may sometimes be much less "natural" than is presumed. It is presumed that at least two transmissions over three generations are required for a practice, belief or object to be seen as traditional; some traditions were deliberately invented for one reason or another to highlight or enhance the importance of a certain institution. Traditions may be adapted to suit the needs of the day, the changes can become accepted as a part of the ancient tradition. Tradition changes with changes from one generation to the next being seen as significant. Thus, those carrying out the traditions will not be consciously aware of the change, if a tradition undergoes major changes over many generations, it will be seen as unchanged. There are various fields of tradition. Beliefs or customs instituted and maintained by societies and governments, such as national anthems and national holidays, such as Federal holidays in the United States. Beliefs or customs maintained by religious denominations and church bodies that share history, culture, and, to some extent, body of teachings.
For example, one can speak of Christianity's tradition. Many objects and customs can be traditional. Rituals of social interaction can be traditional, with phrases and gestures such as saying "thank you", sending birth announcements, greeting cards, etc. Tradition can refer to larger concepts practiced by groups, organizations or societies, such as the practice of national and public holidays; some of the oldest traditions include citizenship. It can include material objects, such as buildings, works of art or tools. Tradition is used as an adjective
Asian Americans
Asian Americans are Americans of Asian ancestry. The term refers to a panethnic group that includes diverse populations, which have ancestral origins in East Asia, South Asia, or Southeast Asia, as defined by the U. S. Census Bureau; this includes people who indicate their race on the census as "Asian" or reported entries such as "Chinese, Indian, Japanese and Other Asian". Asian Americans with other ancestry comprise 5.6% of the U. S. population, while people who are Asian alone, those combined with at least one other race, make up 6.9%. Although migrants from Asia have been in parts of the contemporary United States since the 17th century, large-scale immigration did not begin until the mid-18th century. Nativist immigration laws during the 1880s–1920s excluded various Asian groups prohibiting all Asian immigration to the continental United States. After immigration laws were reformed during the 1940s–60s, abolishing national origins quotas, Asian immigration increased rapidly. Analyses of the 2010 census have shown that Asian Americans are the fastest growing racial or ethnic minority in the United States.
As with other racial and ethnicity-based terms and common usage have changed markedly through the short history of this term. Prior to the late 1960s, people of Asian ancestry were referred to as Oriental and Mongoloid. Additionally, the American definition of'Asian' included West Asian ethnic groups Jewish Americans, Armenian Americans, Assyrian Americans, Iranian Americans, Kurdish Americans, Arab Americans, although these groups are now considered Middle Eastern American; the term Asian American was coined by historian Yuji Ichioka, credited with popularizing the term, to frame a new "inter-ethnic-pan-Asian American self-defining political group" in the late 1960s. Changing patterns of immigration and an extensive period of exclusion of Asian immigrants have resulted in demographic changes that have in turn affected the formal and common understandings of what defines Asian American. For example, since the removal of restrictive "national origins" quotas in 1965, the Asian-American population has diversified to include more of the peoples with ancestry from various parts of Asia.
Today, "Asian American" is the accepted term for most formal purposes, such as government and academic research, although it is shortened to Asian in common usage. The most used definition of Asian American is the U. S. Census Bureau definition, which includes all people with origins in the Far East, Southeast Asia, the Indian subcontinent; this is chiefly because the census definitions determine many governmental classifications, notably for equal opportunity programs and measurements. According to the Oxford English Dictionary, "Asian person" in the United States is sometimes thought of as a person of East Asian descent. In vernacular usage, "Asian" is used to refer to those of East Asian descent or anyone else of Asian descent with epicanthic eyefolds; this differs from the U. S. Census definition and the Asian American Studies departments in many universities consider all those of East, South or Southeast Asian descent to be "Asian". In the US Census, people with origins or ancestry in the Far East, Southeast Asia, the Indian subcontinent are classified as part of the Asian race.
As such, "Asian" and "African" ancestry are seen as racial categories for the purposes of the Census, since they refer to ancestry only from those parts of the Asian and African continents that are outside the Middle East and North Africa. In 1980 and before, Census forms listed particular Asian ancestries as separate groups, along with white and black or negro. Asian Americans had been classified as "other". In 1977, the federal Office of Management and Budget issued a directive requiring government agencies to maintain statistics on racial groups, including on "Asian or Pacific Islander". By the 1990 census, "Asian or Pacific Islander" was included as an explicit category, although respondents had to select one particular ancestry as a subcategory. Beginning with the 2000 census, two separate categories were used: "Asian American" and "Native Hawaiian and Other Pacific Islander"; the definition of Asian American has variations that derive from the use of the word American in different contexts.
Immigration status, citizenship and language ability are some variables that are used to define American for various purposes and may vary in formal and everyday usage. For example, restricting American to include only U. S. citizens conflicts with discussions of Asian American businesses, which refer both to citizen and non-citizen owners. In a PBS interview from 2004, a panel of Asian American writers discussed how some groups include people of Middle Eastern descent in the Asian American category. Asian American author Stewart Ikeda has noted, "The definition of'Asian American' frequently depends on who's asking, who's defining, in what context, why... the possible definitions of'Asian-Pacific American' are many and shifting... some scholars in Asian American Studies conferences suggest that Russians and Israelis all might fit the field's subject of study." Jeff Yang, of the Wall Street Journal, writes that the panethnic definition of Asian American is a unique American construct, as an identity is "in beta".
Scholars have grappled with the accuracy, correctn
Multiculturalism
The term multiculturalism has a range of meanings within the contexts of sociology, of political philosophy, of colloquial use. In sociology and in everyday usage, it is a synonym for "ethnic pluralism", with the two terms used interchangeably, for example, a cultural pluralism in which various ethnic groups collaborate and enter into a dialogue with one another without having to sacrifice their particular identities, it can describe a mixed ethnic community area where multiple cultural traditions exist or a single country within which they do. Groups associated with an aboriginal or autochthonous ethnic group and foreigner ethnic groups are the focus. In reference to sociology, multiculturalism is the end-state of either a natural or artificial process and occurs on either a large national scale or on a smaller scale within a nation's communities. On a smaller scale this can occur artificially when a jurisdiction is established or expanded by amalgamating areas with two or more different cultures.
On a large scale, it can occur as a result of either legal or illegal migration to and from different jurisdictions around the world. Multiculturalism as a political philosophy involves policies which vary widely, it has been described as as a "cultural mosaic" -- in contrast to a melting pot. In the political philosophy of multiculturalism, ideas are focused on the ways in which societies are either believed to or should, respond to cultural and religious differences, it is associated with "identity politics", "the politics of difference", "the politics of recognition". It is a matter of economic interests and political power. In more recent times political multiculturalist ideologies have been expanding in their use to include and define disadvantaged groups such as African Americans, LGBT, with arguments focusing on ethnic and religious minorities, minority nations, indigenous peoples and the disabled, it is within this context in which the term is most understood and the broadness and scope of the definition, as well as its practical use, has been the subject of serious debate.
Most debates over multiculturalism center around whether or not multiculturalism is the appropriate way to deal with diversity and immigrant integration. The arguments regarding the perceived rights to a multicultural education include the proposition that it acts as a way to demand recognition of aspects of a group's culture subordination and its entire experience in contrast to a melting pot or non-multicultural societies; the term multiculturalism is most used in reference to Western nation-states, which had achieved a de facto single national identity during the 18th and/or 19th centuries. Multiculturalism has been official policy in several Western nations since the 1970s, for reasons that varied from country to country, including the fact that many of the great cities of the Western world are made of a mosaic of cultures; the Canadian government has been described as the instigator of multicultural ideology because of its public emphasis on the social importance of immigration. The Canadian Royal Commission on Bilingualism and Biculturalism is referred to as the origins of modern political awareness of multiculturalism.
In the Western English-speaking countries, multiculturalism as an official national policy started in Canada in 1971, followed by Australia in 1973 where it is maintained today. It was adopted as official policy by most member-states of the European Union. Right-of-center governments in several European states – notably the Netherlands and Denmark – have reversed the national policy and returned to an official monoculturalism. A similar reversal is the subject of debate in the United Kingdom, among others, due to evidence of incipient segregation and anxieties over "home-grown" terrorism. Several heads-of-state or heads-of-government have expressed doubts about the success of multicultural policies: The United Kingdom's ex-Prime Minister David Cameron, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Australia's ex-prime minister John Howard, Spanish ex-prime minister Jose Maria Aznar and French ex-president Nicolas Sarkozy have voiced concerns about the effectiveness of their multicultural policies for integrating immigrants.
Many nation-states in Africa and the Americas are culturally diverse and are'multicultural' in a descriptive sense. In some, communalism is a major political issue; the policies adopted by these states have parallels with multiculturalist policies in the Western world, but the historical background is different, the goal may be a mono-cultural or mono-ethnic nation-building – for instance in the Malaysian government's attempt to create a'Malaysian race' by 2020. Multiculturalism is seen by its supporters as a fairer system that allows people to express who they are within a society, more tolerant and that adapts better to social issues, they argue that culture is not one definable thing based on one race or religion, but rather the result of multiple factors that change as the world changes. Support for modern multiculturalism stems from the changes in Western societies after World War II, in what Susanne Wessendorf calls the "human rights revolution", in which the horrors of institutionalized racism and ethnic cleansing became impossible to ignore in the wake of the Holocaust.
