Across the globe, both policy legitimacy and practical utility of multicultural education seem to be challenged and undermined by a number of inter-related, epidemic events, including anti-immigration registration, anti-multiculturalism movement, the rises of parochial nationalism (e.g., America First and Brexit), prevalent concerns (and fears) for influx of refugees, and dividing religious/ethnic/party lines in every social sphere within a nation-state, etc. Reflecting this contemporary context, we aim to bolster the policy legitimacy and practical utility of multicultural education through this special issue. By assembling a strong line-up of research papers, we intend to display a kaleidoscope of policy influences and practical contributions of multicultural education in different countries.
Of the five articles in the special issue, the first three articles shed light on important policy features of multicultural education in the U.S., the U.K., Europe, and China. Drawing on their historical analysis of multicultural education policies in New York and London during the 1980s, Johnson and Caraballo document that multicultural education policies in both cities were triggered by ‘a convergence of Black community demands for equal educational opportunities and a representative curriculum,’ coupled with government efforts to address tensions rooted in racial unrest. Based on identifying a historical trajectory of multicultural education policies since then, Johnson and Caraballo propose a conceptual lens, which they call ‘the interest-convergence-divergence cycle,’ to help to understand the current and future multicultural education policies.
In the second article, Kim and Byun explore how immigration integration policy shapes adolescents’ attitudes towards ethnic minorities across European countries. Based on their robust analysis of representative samples from multiple countries, they report that adolescents in a country with more inclusive and multiculturalist policies for integrating immigrant populations into the host society tend to show more positive attitudes towards ethnic minorities. This finding is straightforward but powerful, because the cross-national comparative study empirically evidences that inclusive and multiculturalist policies for immigrant minorities are key macro contexts that can be trickled down to individual students’ attitudes to immigrant populations. At the same time, there is a twist in the finding, given the significant interaction effect between immigrant integration policies and family socioeconomic status (SES) of non-immigrant students, suggesting that the effect of inclusive integration policies on non-immigrant adolescents’ attitudes towards immigrant populations can be differentially reshaped by their SES.
Kong and Yu’s article shows the role of multicultural education policy in another distinctive context – i.e., China. They examine Chinese national policy documents and laws from 1982 to 2012 in order to trace how multicultural education had been articulated in China. This is an important investigation, given that there are 55 ethnic minority groups in China whose educational opportunities appear to be differentially molded. Indeed, Kong and Yu identify that while the central government started to support the idea of bilingual education and linguistic diversity through various policies, it also had maintained a patriarchal relationship between Han Chinese (the mainstream ethnic group) and the rest of ethnic minorities in those policies during the period. Put differently, the internal ethnic hierarchy was concealed by policy lexicons supporting bilingual education and teacher quality in China.
The last two articles focus on practical issues on the ground. Rudnick’s article touches upon colorblind ideology. Specifically, he unveils key issues of race-talk in the context of colorblind ideology. Based on in-depth interviews with teacher education students in the U.S., he reveals five inter-related themes about colorblind ideology: racial socialization, feeling about and dealing with race talk, abstract liberalism, the pitfalls of good intentions, and institutional challenges. From a practical perspective, Rudnick’s study shows that using a race-specific language with open-mind can advance multicultural education for pre-service teachers, instead of adopting a race-mute language in colorblind ideology.
Another article by Shah et al. addresses how to teach critical global consciousness for undergraduates. Equipped with concepts such as global citizenship and civic mindedness, they offer a number of practical insights about how critical global consciousness can be promoted in an undergraduate course. The main reason why Shah and colleagues’ approach to critical global consciousness is convincing is because their professional identity as transnational multicultural educators and their commitment to reaching out all students in the undergraduate course are vividly depicted in this article.
We believe that the five articles in this special issue capture a snapshot of key features of multicultural education policies across different countries and also detail some groundwork about how we can promote multicultural education practically and critically for social justice, diversity, and humanity in higher education settings. Therefore, in response to the global events noted above that challenge the policy legitimacy and practical utility of multicultural education, we posit that the shelf life of multicultural education remains effective until our education system and society fully cultivate humanity and global citizenship.