Abstract
Multicultural theory and practice have in recent years been subjected to substantial criticism. While some of these criticisms can be dismissed as grounded in discriminatory attitudes, others are less easily swept aside, as they are underwritten by values that multiculturalists tend to affirm. A harm reduction approach, that recognizes that reasonable citizens can disagree about some multicultural practices while at the same time acknowledging that attempts at prohibition are either exceedingly costly or contrary to the very values that opponents subscribe to, can provide an alternative foundation for some multicultural accommodations to which both opponents and advocates can subscribe. It involved permitting contested behaviours while imposing regulations aimed at minimizing the harms relative to shared values that they can give rise to.
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Notes
The Supreme Court of Canada held that the criminal bans on such practices were unconstitutional because they violated the right of sex workers to life, liberty and security under the Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms. See Canada (Attorney General) v. Bedford, 2013 SCC 72, [2013] 3 S.C.R. 1101.
As it happens, Gerry Mackie has shown, on both theoretical and empirical grounds, that FGM is eradicable when it is construed as a collective action problem, one that responds to practices of convention change, rather than through the tools of the criminal law (Mackie 1996).
Loyola High School v. Quebec (Attorney General), 2015 SCC 12, [2015] 1 S.C.R. 613.
These objections were urged upon me by participants in the MANCEPT panel at which this paper was initially presented. I thank all participants for their thoughtful and challenging questions.
Thanks to Johanna Cline for her excellent research assistance.
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This research was made possible by a research grant from the Canadian Institutes on Health Research, Grant #153012.
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Weinstock, D.M. Multiculturalism as Harm Reduction. Res Publica 29, 611–627 (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11158-023-09585-4
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11158-023-09585-4