Ethnic and Race Relations

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Ethnic and Race Relations

• Identities, diversity, and
• group relations

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Current Issues of Ethnicity in Canada and the
World

• Canada
• Influence of immigration on economy, politics,
  and lifestyles
• Equal participation of all groups in the life of
  the country
• Perpetuation of diversity or a new consensus?

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• Global upsurge of ethnic identification and
  conflict
• Contrary to the supposition that racial and
  ethnic distinctions would decline with
  modernization
• Marxism class would supercede ethnicity
• Industrial theorists occupational, professional,
  or educational status would replace ethnicity

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Defining Ethnicity

• Ethnicity the sets of social distinctions by
  which groups differentiate themselves from one
  another on the basis of presumed biological ties
• Common biological origin need not be real, but it
  must be believed real

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• Although the symbolic markers that differentiate
  ethnic groups are usually cultural, and seldom
  biological (except for race), cultural
  distinctiveness is not sufficient to characterize
  a group as ethnic
• Symbolic markers language, religion, attachment
  to homeland, common history, ceremonies,
  traditions, etc.

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Defining Race

• Race is a group defined on the basis of perceived
  physical differences
• Biological markers are perceived as more
  important than symbolic markers
• Race has social, not biological, significance
• Distinct and definite biological races do not
  exist
• Canada term visible minority is used, to avoid
  negative connotations of race

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Ethnic Communities, Groups, and Categories

• People differ in the degree of relevance that
  they attach to ethnicity
• Ethnic community
• Ethnic group
• Ethnic catergory

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• Ethnic community a set of ethnic institutions
  based on common interest and identity
• Ethnic group minor relevance, but members still
  act on ethnic interests
• Ethnic category an objective measure of ethnic
  origin, regardless of identification

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Pluralistic Theories of Ethnicity

• Ethnic differences are natural and/or inevitable
• Sociobiology
• Primordialism
• Barth ethnic differences are caused by patterns
  of social interaction that generate ethnic group
  boundaries

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• Symbolic markers evolve over time they are not
  natural
• Membership implies shared criteria of evaluation
• Communication with non-members is restricted to
  areas of assumed common understanding
• Similar to emergent identity approach

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Remedial Theories of Ethnicity

• Ethnic differences are not inevitable
• Caused by class or cultural factors that inhibit
  economic rationality
• Split labour market (Bonacic) employers use
  ethnic distinctions to pay workers differentially
• Ethnic groups then fight over jobs

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• Internal colonialism a dominant core and an
  ethnically defined periphery
• State policies influence ethnic relations and
  identification, and control ethnic group
  activities (Panitch)

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• Symbolic ethnicity (Gans) a resurgence in
  personal ethnic identification since the late
  1960s does not interfere with the similarity of
  peoples lives
• Assumption symbolic ethnicity does not produce
  social divisions

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• Popular in the US
• Canadian critique
• It does not reflect corporate character of many
  ethnic groups
• It neglects links between ethnicity and
  inequality

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Canadian Research on Ethnicity

• Porter Canada is a vertical mosaic
• Immigrants retain their entrance status, which
  promotes ethnic community organization
• Guindon the self-segregation of the charter
  groups results in parallel societies
• Other ethnic groups also engage in institutional
  self-segregation
• Differences are preserved and fostered

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• Breton institutional completeness
• A degree to which an ethnic community offers a
  range of services to members

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Ethnicity and Politics

• Canadian state defines ethnic groups as cultural
• However, its funding policies promote
  politicization of ethnic groups
• Legitimation of umbrella organizations

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Ethnicity and Gender

• Stasiulis Canadian policies make immigrant women
  dependent on husbands and other male relatives
• Because of their limited knowledge of the
  official languages and available social services,
  they are often highly centered on their families
• They participate in gendered division of labour
  in the workplace

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• Ethnic umbrella organization often refuse support
  to womens organizations
• Position of Native women the precedence of
  Aboriginal rights over the Canadian Charter of
  Rights and Freedoms

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Patterns of Immigration to Canada and the US

• The US is seen as a nation of immigrants
• Large numbers of immigrants had an acknowledged
  crucial role in industrialization and
  modernization of the US
• The melting pot ideology
• Immigrants will discard old identities and become
  Americans

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• In Canada, immigrants were seen as fulfilling an
  economic function
• They were not expected to alter the political
  balance, predetermined by the relationship
  between the charter groups

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Traditional Immigration to Canada

• Originally, immigration from Britain and Northern
  Europe was favoured
• After 1880, immigrants from Eastern Europe
  settled in farming regions in the West
• After 1900, Southern Europeans started
  immigrating as manual labourers

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• About 50 of immigrants who arrived from 190030
  returned home or moved to the US
• After WWII, economic prosperity led to a
  significant demand for immigrant labour

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The New Immigration

• Since the late 1960s, the increasing number of
  immigrants are non-European, particularly Asian
• This results in the increased proportion of
  visible minorities in Canadian population
• Concentration of immigrants in urban centres

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• The size of immigration and concentration of
  immigrants perpetuate problems of integration
• Contribution to regionalization of Canada
• Difficulties for immigrants themselves in work
  and housing markets
• Probability of prejudice and racism

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Bilingualism

• Goal promotion of national unity
• Problem the issue of FrenchEnglish relations is
  defined as an issue of language
• Guindon official bilingualism has divided
  Canadians
• Quebecois and Anglophones outside Quebec did not
  benefit from bilingualism
• Francophones outside Quebec and Anglophones in
  Quebec benefited

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• Breton bilingualism has raised the status of
  francophones outside Quebec
• This has unintentionally lowered the relative
  status of other groups

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Multiculturalism

• Goals tolerance among cultural groups and
  preservation of their values and traditions
• Unintended consequences divisions between
  Canadians and politicization of ethnic groups

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• Multiculturalism is inherently limited, because
  it is culturally defined
• The policy may be outdated
• 40 of population in the 2001 census identified
  themselves as Canadian
• Intermarriages are increasingly common

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Prejudice

• Prejudice is attitude
• Prejudice is prejudgment of an individual on the
  basis of a stereotype about group
  characteristics.
• Many Canadians hold positive prejudice toward
  charter groups and negative prejudice toward
  Native people, Blacks, and East Indians.

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Discrimination

• Discrimination a differential, usually unfair,
  treatment of an individual because of his/her
  membership in a group or category
• Institutional (structural) discrimination a part
  of an institutional structure which is not
  intended to be discriminatory
• Difficult to eliminate

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• Self-segregation may be seen as a form of
  systemic discrimination
• Self-segregation makes institutional
  discrimination both common and acceptable to
  Canadians

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Racism

• A belief that one racial group is superior to
  others
• Considers physical differences an index to
  psychic and social differences
• Overt racism
• e.g., white supremacy
• Racists can take advantage of institutional
  discrimination

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• Scientific racism an attempt to categorize
  groups along a evolutionary, intellectual, and
  moral continuum
• Races are caused by a differential rate of
  evolution
• Canadian racism northern climate makes people
  hard-working, self-reliant, and honest

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Discrimination in Canadian Society

• Immigrant face structural disadvantages upon
  entry into a new country
• They often lack knowledge of the language,
  customs and expectations, social networks, etc.
• Discrimination exists if these disadvantages are
  unevenly distributed or unevenly persistent
  across groups

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• Evidence of discrimination in Canada is
  inconsistent
• De Silva immigrants from East Asian and the
  Caribbean do not achieve income equality with the
  Canadian-born, as other immigrants do
• Li immigrant women and immigrant
  visible-minority men are at an income disadvantage

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• Income inequality of immigrants seems to result
  from recent time of arrival (i.e., structural
  disadvantages), rather than from overt
  discrimination

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• Immigrants with university degrees had income
  advantage over the Canadian average in 1981, but
  had a disadvantage by 1992
• Henry and Ginzbergs 1984 study showed
  discrimination against blacks in the job
  application process
• A replication in 1989 did not show this result

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• Occupational dissimilarity between most major
  ethnic groups and the rest of the labour force
  has been declining