ARE MULTICULTURALIST THEORIES VICTIMS OF THE “CULTURAL ESSENTIALISM” FALLACY?
ARE MULTICULTURALIST THEORIES VICTIMS OF THE “CULTURAL ESSENTIALISM” FALLACY?

Summary/Abstract: In this essay, the author seeks to show that one of the main objections raised against multiculturalist theories, the cultural essentialism fallacy, provides no decisive or conclusive grounds for rejecting one variant of these theories which are conceived along an egalitarian line of argument and emanate from a liberal culturalist/nationalist perspective. After examining what he considers to be one of the best defences of the politics of protection of cultures, namely Kymlicka’s egalitarian argument, the author goes on to show that none of the versions of the cultural essentialism objection found in the recent books on multiculturalism by Brian Barry, Seyla Benhabib and Amy Gutmann, namely the “stasis”, the “holistic”, and the “distinctness” fallacy, appears sufficiently persuasive to undermine the egalitarian argument.

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