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Talking Culture: New Boundaries, New Rhetorics of Exclusion in Europe
Author(s): Verena Stolcke
Source: Current Anthropology, Vol. 36, No. 1, Special Issue: Ethnographic Authority and
Cultural Explanation (Feb., 1995), pp. 1-24
Published by: The University of Chicago Press on behalf of Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological
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ANTHROPOLOGY
Volume 36, Number i, FebruaryI995
CURRENT
Research.All rightsreserved
OOII-3204/95/360i-0003$2.00
FoundationforAnthropological
I995 byThe Wenner-Gren
?
SIDNEY W. MINTZ LECTURE
FOR I993
Talking Culture
New Boundaries,New Rhetorics
of Exclusion in Europe'
by Verena Stolcke
(D.Phil.,I970). She conductedfieldand archivalresearchin Cuba
in I967-68 and in Sao Paulo,Brazil,betweenI973 and I979. She
is theauthorofMarriage,Class, and Colourin NineteenthPress,I974, reCenturyCuba (Cambridge:CambridgeUniversity
ofMichiganPressin i989), Planters,
printedbytheUniversity
and Wives:Class Conflictand GenderRelationson
Workers,
SaioPaulo Plantations,i850-i980 (Oxford:St. Antony's/MacmilofSocial Inlan, i988); "Women'sLabours:The Naturalisation
in OfMarriageand the
equalityand Women'sSubordination,"
Market,editedby K. Young,C. Wolkowitz,and R. McCullagh
(London:Routledgeand KeganPaul, i98i), "New Reproductive
and GeneticEngiReproductive
Technologies-Old Fatherhood,"
in
neeringI (i), and "Is Sex to Genderas Race Is to Ethnicity?"
editedbyTeresadel Valle (London:
GenderedAnthropology,
Routledge,I993). The presentpaperwas submittedin finalform
I5 VI 94.
Es gibt zwei Sortenvon Ratten,
die hungrigenund die satten;
die Satten bleiben vergniigtzuhaus,
die Hungrigenwandernaus . . .
Oh weh, sie sind schon in der Ndh.
HEINRICH
HEINE
In the contemporary
debateconcerning
and
Europeanintegration
the "problem"ofThirdWorldimmigration
no less thanin develEverywhere,and fromnow on as much in the sociin thepast decade,theboundednessof
opmentsin anthropology
ety of originas in the host society,[the immigrant]
Anculturesand culturaldifference
have gainednew prominence.
calls fora completerethinkingof the legitimate
needsnot onlyto explorehow globalizationaffects
thropology
thediscipline'sclassicalsubjectsbut also to paymoreattention
bases of citizenshipand of the relationshipbetween
to thenew waysin whichculturaldifferences
and cleavagesare
the state and the nation or nationality.An absent
thepoliticalrightin Euconceptualized
at its source.In effect,
he obliges us to question not only the reacpresence,
ropehas in thepastdecadedevelopeda politicalrhetoric
ofexclutions ofrejectionwhich,takingthe state as an exsionin whichThirdWorldimmigrants,
who proceedin part
fromits ex-colonies,are construedas posinga threatto thenapressionof the nation, are vindicated by claiming to
tionalunityofthe "host" countriesbecausetheyare culturally
base citizenshipon commonalityoflanguage and
This rhetoricofexclusionhas generally
been identified
different.
culture
(ifnot "race") but also the assimilationist
as a new formofracism.I argue,instead,that,ratherthanas"generosity"that,confidentthat the state, armed
endowmentsofhumanraces,it postulatesa prosertingdifferent
with education, will know how to reproducethe naThis assumptionunpensityin humannatureto rejectstrangers.
derliesa radicaloppositionbetweennationalsand immigrants
as
tion,would seek to conceal a universalistchauvininformed
foreigners
by a reifiednotionofboundedand distinct,
ism.
localizednational-cultural
identityand heritagethatis employed
PIERRE
BOURDIEU
to rationalizethecall forrestrictive
immigration
policies.Followinga systematiccomparisonofthe contrasting
conceptualstrucI concludethatthecontemporary
turesofthe two doctrines,
culThe uniqueness of European culture,which emerges
turalfundamentalism
ofthepoliticalrightis, withrespectto
fromthe historyof the diversityofregionaland natraditional
racism,bothold and new. It is old in thatit drawsfor
tional cultures,constitutesthe basic prerequisitefor
its argumentative
in the
forceon theunresolvedcontradiction
union.
European
and
modernconceptionofthenation-state
betweenan organicist
COMMUNITIES
OF THE EUROPEAN
COMMISSION
a voluntarist
idea ofbelonging.It is new in that,becauseracism
it attributes
has becomediscredited
theallegedincompolitically,
betweendifferent
patibility
culturesto an incapacityofdifferent As anthropology
graduallyoutgrowspostmodernistselfculturesto communicatethatis inherentin humannature.
in theDeVERENA STOLCKE
is professor
ofsocial anthropology
de Historiade SociedadesPrecapitalistas
partamento
y Antropologia Social oftheUniversidadAut6nomade Barcelona.Bornin
Germanyin I938, she was educatedat OxfordUniversity
as the I993 SidneyW. MintzLecture
i. This paperwas delivered,
oftheJohnsHopkinsUniverto theDepartmentofAnthropology
sityon Novemberi5, I993. It is based on researchconductedir
i99i-92 whileI was a JeanMonnetfellowat theEuropeanUniver
sityInstitutein Florence.I thankespeciallymyfellowfellowsMi
Eric Heilman,and Sol Picciottoforthe many
chael Harbsmeier,
discussionswe had on thetopicsI raiseandRam6nVald6&
fruitful
of the UniversidadAut6nomade Barcelonaforhis commentsor
an earlierversion.
scrutinyand culturalself-examinationand moves back
into the real world,neitherthe worldnor the discipline
have leamed to
is any longerthe same. Anthropologists
involved
be moresensitiveto the formidabledifficulties
in making sense of cultural diversitywithout losing
sightofsharedhumanity.At the same time,the notions
anthropology'sclassiof cultureand culturaldifference,
have become ubiquitous in the popucal stock-in-trade,
lar and political languagein which Westerngeopolitical
conflictsand realignmentsarebeingphrased.Anthropologists in recentyears have paid heightenedcriticalattentionto the many ways in which Westerneconomic
and culturalhegemonyhas invadedthe restofthe world
and to how "other" cultureshave resistedand reworked
T
2
CURRENT
ANTHROPOLOGY
Volume 36, Number i, FebruaryI995
theseinsidiousinfluences.How these "others"are being
politicallyand culturallyrethoughtby the West,where
the idea of culturaldistinctnessis being endowed with
new divisiveforce,has, however,attractedsurprisingly
little interestamong anthropologists.I want to address
one major instance of contemporaryculture-bounded
political rhetoric.
SidneyMintz has workedformany yearstowarduncoveringthe logic and power of racism in systems of
dominationand exclusionin the New World.It is surely
appropriateto focus my lecturein his honor on the resurgenceof essentialistideologiesin the Old World.On
one of his tripsto Paris he himselfprophesiedsome of
thesedevelopmentsmorethan 2o yearsago,notingthat,
whereasissues of race were absentfromFrenchanthropology,in contrastwith the North American variety,
because of the different
positions the discipline's subjects (internallyor externallycolonial) occupied in relationto the respectivenationalcommunities,Francewas
beginningto experienceracismas ever-growing
numbers
ofimmigrantsarrivedfromits ex-colonies(Mintz I 97I).
The alarmingspread of hostilityand violence in Europe againstimmigrantsfromthe ThirdWorldhas provoked much soul-searchingin the past decade over the
resurgenceof the old demon of racism in a new guise. I
want to propose,however,thata perceptibleshiftin the
rhetoricof exclusion can now be detected.From what
were once assertionsof the differing
endowmentof human races therehas risen since the seventiesa rhetoric
of inclusion and exclusion that emphasizes the distinctiveness of cultural identity,traditions,and heritage
amonggroupsand assumes the closureofcultureby territory(Soysal I993). I intendfirstto examine the nature
of this shift in the way in which European antiimmigrantsentimentis phrased.Then I will trace the
social and political roots and the implicationsof this
new rhetoric.The formationofliberalstatesand notions
of belonginghas, of course, been quite different
from
one WesternEuropeancountryto another.Historymay
explainthe originsofthese different
political traditions,
but it is not the cause of theircontinuity;each period
interpretshistory according to contemporaryneeds.
Therefore,I will conclude by contrastingthe ways in
which the national political repertoiresof Britainand
France have shaped and been employed to legitimate
mountinganimosityagainstimmigrants.
The buildingof Europe is a twofoldprocess.As intramorepermeable,
Europeanbordersbecome progressively
externalboundariesare evermore tightlyclosed.2Stringentlegal controlsare put in place to exclude what have
come to be known as extracommunitarian
immigrants
as partiesof the rightappeal forelectoral supportwith
the slogan "ForeignersOut!" There is a growingsense
thatEuropeansneed to develop a feelingof sharedcultureand identityofpurposein orderto providethe ideological support for European economic and political
union that will enable it to succeed. But the idea of a
supranational culturally integratedEurope and how
much space is to be accorded to national and regional
cultures and identities are mattersof intense dispute
because of the challenge to national sovereigntiesthey
are variously felt to pose (Gallo I989; Cassen I993;
Commissionofthe EuropeanCommunitiesI987, I992).
By contrast,immigrants,in particularthose fromthe
poorSouth (and,more recently,also fromthe East) who
seek shelterin the wealthyNorth,have all overWestern
Europecome to be regardedas undesirable,threatening
strangers,aliens. The extracommunitarian
immigrants
already"in our midst" are the targetsof mountinghostilityand violence as politiciansofthe rightand conservative governmentsfuel popular fearswith a rhetoric
Dfexclusion that extols national identitypredicatedon
zulturalexclusiveness.
The social and political tensionsthat extracommunitarianimmigrationhas provokedin a contextof succes3ive economic crises have been accompanied by a
heightenedconcernovernationalculturalidentitiesthat
has eroded the cosmopolitanhopes professedin the aftermathof the deadly horrorsof the Nazi race policies
f World War II. The demons of race and eugenics ap?earedto have been politicallyifnot scientificallyexor,ised partlyby the work done by UNESCO and other
)odiesin defenseofhuman equalityin culturaldiversity
Lnthe Boasian traditionafterI945 (Nye I993:669; Levi5traussI978, I985; Haraway I988). Yet culturalidentity
md distinctiveness,ideas which until then seemed to
)e a peculiar obsession only of anthropologists,have
iow come to occupy a centralplace in the way in which
sentimentsand policies are being rainti-immigration
;ionalized.
There is a growingpropensityin the popularmood in
Europe to blame all the socioeconomic ills resulting
:rom the recession and capitalist readjustmentsanemployment,housing shortages, mounting delinluency,deficienciesin social services-on immigrants
xho lack "our" moral and cultural values, simplybe:ause they are there (see TaguieffI99I for a detailed
and challengeof these imputationsin the case
mnalysis
AfFrance.)The advocates of a halt to immigrationand
.ike-mindedpoliticians have added to the popular aninositytowardimmigrantsby artificiallyincreasingthe
5cale of the "problem." Allusions to an "immigration
lood" and an "emigrationbomb" serveto intensifydifuse popularfears,therebydivertingspreadingsocial dis,ontentfromthe truecauses ofthe economic recession.
Dpponentsof immigrationoftenadd to this the consercontrolis
2. One signof the sense of urgencyoverimmigration
iative demographicargumentwhich attributesdeclinbodies,such as theTrevigroupof ng socioeconomic opportunitiesand povertyand the
theinformal
intergovernmental
and the Schengen
the Ad Hoc Groupon Immigration,
ministers,
which :onsequentdesireorneed to emigrateto the "population
These organizations,
Accord,setup sincethemidseventies.
have served,al- )omb" ticking away in the Third World, which is
are not accountableto the EuropeanParliament,
most in secrecy,to harmonizepolicyamongmembercountries )lamed on immigrants' own improvidence. They
(Bunyan I99I, Ford I99I).
;herebymask the economic-politicalroots of modern
STOLCKE
povertyand insteadjustifyaggressivepopulationcontrol
programswhose targetsare women in the poor South.
Advocates of a halt to immigrationtalk of a "threshold
of tolerance,"alluding to what ethologistshave called
the territorialimperative-the alleged factthatpopulations (note, among animals) tend to defendtheirterritory against "intruders"when these exceed a certain
proportionestimatedvariouslyat 12-25 % because otherwiseseveresocial tensionsare boundto arise (Zungaro
i992;
Erdheimi992:i9).
The mediaand politiciansal-
lude to the threatof culturalestrangementor alienation
(Winkleri992, Kallscheueri992). In otherwords,the
"problem" is not "us" but "them." "We" are the measure of the good life which "they" are threateningto
undermine,and this is so because "they" are foreigners
and culturally"different."Althoughrisingunemployment,thehousingshortage,and deficientsocial services
are obviously not the fault of immigrants,"they" are
made into the scapegoatsfor"our" socioecoeffectively
nomic problems.This line of argumentis so persuasive
because it appeals to the "national habitus,"an exclusivist notion of belonging and political and economic
rightsconveyedby the modernidea of the nation-state
(Elias I99I) centralto which is the assumptionthatforeigners,strangersfromwithout,are not entitledto share
in "national" resources and wealth, especially when
these are apparentlybecomingscarce.It is conveniently
forexample,thatimmigrantsoftendo thejobs
forgotten,
that natives won't. Similarlyoverlookedare the otherwise much bemoaned consequences of the population
implosion in the wealthy North, that is, the verylow
birthratesin an agingEurope,forthe viabilityofindustrial nations and the welfarestate (Below-replacement
fertility
I986, BerquoI993).
The questionwhy,ifthere
is shortageof work,intoleranceand aggressionare not
directedagainstone's fellow citizens is neverraised.
The meaning and nature of these rationalizationsof
animositytowardimmigrantsand the need to curb extracommunitarianimmigrationhave been highlycontroversial.I will here analyze the rightistrhetoricof exclusion rather than examining the logic of popular
resentment.Popularreactionsand sentianti-immigrant
mentscannotsimplybe extrapolatedfromthe discourse
of the political class.
Immigrants:A Threat to the Cultural
Integrityof the Nation
Talking Culture| 3
immigrantcommunitiesand its call fora curbon immigrationhad anythingto do with racism (see Asad I990
on the idea ofBritishness,constructedout of the values
and sensibilitiesof the Englishdominantclass; see also
to live among
Dodd I986). People "by nature"preferred
their"own kind" ratherthanin a multiculturalsociety,
this attitudebeing, "afterall," a "natural," instinctive
culreactionto the presence of people with a different
tureand origin.As AlfredSherman,directoroftherightwing Institutefor Policy Studies and one of the main
theoreticiansof this doctrine,elaboratedin I978, "Nationalconsciousnessis the sheetanchorfortheunconditionalloyaltiesand acceptanceofdutiesand responsibilities,based on personalidentificationwith the national
community,which underliecivic dutyand patriotism"
(quotedin Barkeri98i:2o;
see also I979). Immigrants
in large numbers would destroythe "homogeneityof
the nation." A multiracial(sic) societywould inevitably
endangerthe "values" and "culture" ofthe whitemajorityand unleash social conflict.These were nonrational,
instinctualfearsbuilt aroundfeelingsof loyaltyand belonging(Barkerand Beezer I983: I25).3 As Enoch Powell
had arguedin I969, "an instinctto preservean identity
is one ofthe deepestand strongest
and defenda territory
implantedin mankind . . . and . . . its beneficialeffects
arenotexhausted"(quotedin Barkeri98i:22).
Until the late seventiessuch nationalistclaims were
putforwardonlyby a few(thoughvociferous)ideologues
ofthe rightwho went out oftheirway to distancethemselves fromthe overtracismofthe National Front,morallydiscreditedbyits associationwithNazi ideology.By
the eighties,with mountingeconomic difficultiesand
growinganimosityagainst immigrants,in an effortto
gain electoralsupportthe Torypartyhad adopteda discourse of exclusion which was similarlyinfusedby exofthenationalcommupressionsoffearfortheintegrity
nity,way oflife,tradition,and loyaltyunderthreatfrom
immigrants(BarkerI979). One symptomaticexample of
this ideological alignmentof the Tory partywith its
rightis MargaretThatcher'smuch-quotedstatementof
I978 that "people are reallyratherafraidthatthis counculture.
trymightbe swampedbypeople witha different
And,you know, the Britishcharacterhas done so much
fordemocracy,forlaw, and done so much throughout
the world, that if there is a fear that it might be
swamped, people are going to react and be hostile to
thosecomingin" (quotedin Fitzpatrick
I987:i2i).
To
protect"the nation" fromthe threatimmigrantswith
alien cultures posed for social cohesion, their entry
needed to be curbed.
In the early eighties Dummett identifieda change in
Britainin the idiom in which rejectionof immigrants
was beingexpressedwhen she drewattentionto the ten- 3. Barkersummedup the argumentof what he called "the new
dencyto attributesocial tensionsto thepresenceof im- racism"as follows:"Immigrants
threaten
to 'swamp'us withtheir
migrantswith alien cultures rather than to racism alien culture:and if theyare allowed in in largenumbers,they
(DummettandMartini982:ioi,
ofthe nation.'At theheartofthis
myemphasis;see also will destroythe 'homogeneity
Dummett I973). As earlyas in the late sixtiesthe right
in Britainwas exalting "Britishculture" and the "national community,"distancingitselffromracial categoriesand denyingwithinsistencethatits hostilitytoward
'new racism'is thenotionofcultureand tradition.
A community
is its culture,its way of lifeand its traditions.
To breaktheseis
to shatterthe community.
These are non-rational
(andindeed,in
thefullyfledgedversion,instinctual),
builtaroundfeelingsofloyaltyand belonging."
4
CURRENT
ANTHROPOLOGY
Volume 36, Number i, FebruaryI995
A similar shiftin the rhetoricof exclusion has also Cultural Fundamentalism:A New
been identifiedwithin the French political right.Ta- Constructionof Exclusion
guieff's(I98I) is probablythe most detailed,thoughcontroversial,analysis of ideological developmentsamong The emergenceof cultureas "the key semanticterrain"
the varioustendenciesof the Frenchrightsince the sev- (Benthall
andKnightI993:2) ofpoliticaldiscourse
needs,
enties. It is controversialbecause the author at once however,to be more carefullyexplored.I want to argue
harshlycriticizesantiracistorganizationsforinvoking, that it is misleading to see in the contemporaryantiin their defense of immigrants'"rightto difference," immigrantrhetoricof the righta new formofracismor
what he regardsas an equally essentialistconceptionof a racismin disguise.This is, of course,no merequibble
culturaldifference
(see also Duranton-CrabolI988). The overwords.Not fora momentdo I want to trivializethe
Frenchrightbegan orchestrating
its anti-immigrant
of- sociopoliticalimportof this novel exaltationof cultural
fensiveby espousingwhat Taguieffhas termeda "differ- difference,
but to combat the beast we need to know
entialracism,"a doctrinewhich exalts the essentialand what sort it is. To this end we need to do more than
irreduciblecultural differenceof non-Europeanimmi- uncoverthe strategicmotives forthe right'sdisavowal
grantcommunities whose presence is condemned for of racism and analyze the conceptual structureof this
threateningthe "host" country'soriginalnational iden- new political discourse and the repertoireof ideas on
tity.A core element of this doctrineof exclusion is the which it draws.
repudiationof "cultural miscegenation"forthe sake of
A substantiveconceptual shiftthat can be detected
the unconditional preservationof one's own original among political rightistsand conservativestoward an
bioculturalidentity.By contrastwithearlier anti-immigrant
purportedly
rhetoricpredicatedon culturaldiversity
"inegalitarianracism" (Taguieff'sterm),ratherthan in- and incommensurability
is, in fact,informedby certain
the "other"it exalts the absolute,irreducible assumptionsimplicitin the modernnotions of citizenferiorizing
differenceof the "self" and the incommensurability
of ship,nationalidentity,and the nation-state.Even ifthis
different
culturalidentities.A key concept of this new celebrationof national-culturalintegrityinstead of aprhetoricis the notion of enracinement(rootedness).To peals to racial purityis a political ploy, this does not
preserveboth Frenchidentityand those of immigrants explain why the rightand conservatives,in theirefforts
in their diversity,the latterought to stay at home or to protect themselves from accusations of racism,
returnthere. Collective identityis increasinglycon- should have resortedto theinvocationofnational-cumceived in termsofethnicity,culture,heritage,tradition, cultural identity and incommensurabilityto do this.
memory,and difference,
with onlyoccasional references This culturalistrhetoricis distinctfromracism in that
to "blood" and "race." As Taguieffhas argued,"differen- it reifiescultureconceivedas a compact,bounded,localtial racism" constitutes a strategydesigned by the ized, and historicallyrootedset of traditionsand values
Frenchrightto mask what has become a "clandestine transmittedthroughthe generationsby drawingon an
racism" (PP. 330-37).
ideological repertoirethat dates back to the contradicNotwithstandingthe insistentemphasis on cultural toryigth-centuryconceptionof the nation-state.4
identityand difference,
scholarshave tendedto identify
Ratherthanassertingdifferent
endowmentsofhuman
a "new style of racism" in the anti-immigrant
rhetoric races,contemporaryculturalfundamentalism(as I have
of the right(BarkerI98I, I979; TaguieffI987; Solomos chosen to designate the contemporaryanti-immigrant
I99I; Wieviorka I993). Several related reasons have rhetoricof the right)emphasizes differencesof cultural
been adduced forthis. Analystsin France no less than heritageand theirincommensurability.
The term"funin Britainattributethis culturalistdiscourse of exclu- damentalism"has conventionallybeen reservedfordesion to a sort of political dialectic between antiracists' scribing antimodern,neotraditionalistreligious phecondemnationof racism forits association with Nazi nomena and movements interpretedas a reaction to
race theoriesand the right'sattemptsto gain political socioeconomicand culturalmodernization.As I will arrespectabilityby masking the racist undertonesof its gue, however,the exaltationin the contemporary
secuanti-immigrant
program.Besides,orderinghumanshier- lar cultural fundamentalismof the rightof primordial
archicallyinto races has become indefensiblescientifi- national identitiesand loyalties is not premodern,for
cally (BarkerI98I, TaguieffI987), and it is a mistake the assumptionson which it is based forma contradicto suppose that racism developedhistoricallyonly as a torypart of modernity
(Dubiel i992, Klingeri992).
justificationof relations of dominationand inequality There is somethinggenuinelydistinctfromtraditional
(BarkerI98I). Lastly, even when this new "theoryof racismin the conceptualstructureofthis new doctrine,
xenophobia" (Barker198I) does not employracial cate- whichhas to do withthe apparentlyanachronisticresurgories,the demand to exclude immigrantsby virtueof gence,in the modern,economicallyglobalizedworld,of
their being culturally different"aliens" is ratified a heightenedsense ofprimordialidentity,culturaldifferthroughappeals to basic human instincts,that is, in
terms of a pseudobiological theory.Even though the
4. See Asad (i990) fora different
thematization
ofBritishidentity
term"race" may,therefore,
be absentfromthisrhetoric, that
attemptsto reconcilea defenseofBritishculturalvalueswith
it is racism nonetheless,a "racism withoutrace" (Rex toleranceforculturaldiversityin the aftermath
of the Rushdie
I973:I9I-9.2; Balibar I99I; Solomos i99i; GilroyI99I:
affair
receivedwithapprovalbyliberalopinionoutsidetheConservativeparty.
I86-87).
STOLCKE
TalkingCultureI s
ence, and exclusiveness. What distinguishesconven- up yet anothercommitteeofinquiry,this time into ractional racismfromthis sortof culturalfundamentalism ism and xenophobia.Its task was to assess the efficacy
is the way in which those who allegedlythreatenthe of the declarationand to update the informationon exsocial peace of the nation are perceived.The difference tra-Europeanimmigrationin the lightof the extension
betweenthese two doctrinesresides,first,in the way in offreedomofmovementwithinEuropeto be introduced
(EuropeanParliamentI990). The notionof
which those who are theirrespectivetargetsare concep- in I992-93
tualized-whether theyare conceived as naturallyinfe- xenophobiawas thus incorporated,withoutany further
riormembersor as strangers,aliens, to the polity,be it attemptto dispel its ambiguities,into European Parliaa state,an empire,or a commonwealth.Culturalfunda- ment parlance. The media and politicianshave equally
mentalism legitimates the exclusion of foreigners, picked up the idea, and it has capturedthe European
strangers.Racism has usually provideda rationalization imaginationin general.It was this terminologicalinnoforclass prerogativesby naturalizingthe socioeconomic vation which firstmade me wonderwhethertherewas
ofthe underprivileged
inferiority
(to disarmthempoliti- not something distinct to the rhetoric of exclusion
cally)or claims ofnational supremacy(BlanckaertI988).
sentimentin WesternEurope
wherebyanti-immigrant
Second, whereas both doctrinesconstituteideological is justified.5
themeswhich "naturalize" and therebyaim to neutral"Xenophobia" literally means "hostility toward
ize specificsociopoliticalcleavages whose real rootsare strangersand all that is foreign"(Le Petit RobertI967).
economic-political,they do this in conceptuallydiffer- Cashmore,in his I984 Dictionary of Race and Ethnic
entways. "Equality" and "difference"tendto be arrayed Relations, still dismissed the term as a "somewhat
against each otherin political discourse in both cases, vague psychologicalconceptdescribinga person'sdispobut the "difference"which is invoked and the meaning sitionto fear(orabhor)otherpersonsorgroupsperceived
with which it is endowed differ.There may be occa- as outsiders" because of its uncertain meaning and
sional referencesto "blood" or "race," but thereis more hence its limitedanalyticalvalue in thatit presupposes
to this culturalist discourse than the idea of insur- underlyingcauses which it does not analyze; therefore,
mountableessentialculturaldifferences
or a kindofbio- he thought(as it has turnedout, wrongly),"it has fallen
race and ethnicrelationsvocabulogical culturalism(Lawrence I982:83), namely,the as- fromthecontemporary
sumptionthat relations between different
culturesare lary" (P. 3I4). Eitherthe root causes of this attitudeare
by "nature"hostile and mutuallydestructivebecause it not specifiedor it is takenforgrantedthatpeople have a
is in humannatureto be ethnocentric;different
cultures "natural"propensityto fearand rejectoutsidersbecause
The right'sexplicitsympathyand the
to be kept apartfortheirown good.
ought,therefore,
theyare different.6
Homoxenophobicus
A furthersuppositionregardinghuman nature can, in
effect,be foundin political as well as populardiscourse
on extracommunitarianimmigrationin the eighties.
Newspaper headlines, politicians, and scholars invoke
the term "xenophobia" along with racism to describe
mountinganti-immigrant
animosity.In I984, forexample, the European Parliamentconvened a committeeof
inquiryto reporton the rise of fascism and racism in
Europein a firstattemptto assess the extentand meaning of anti-immigrant
hostility.In I985 the committee
concludedthat"a new typeofspectrenow hauntsEuropean politics: xenophobophilia." The reportdescribed
xenophobiaas "a latentresentmentor 'feeling,'an attitude thatgoes beforefascismor racism and can prepare
the groundforthem but, in itself,does not fall within
the purviewof the law and legal prevention(Evregenis
i985:6o). The componentsof this more or less diffuse
feelingand of increasingtensionsbetween the national
and immigrantcommunitiesand theirassociation with
a general sense of social malaise, it was argued,were
admittedlydifficultto identify,but one element was
"the time-honoureddistrustof strangers,fearof the futurecombinedwith a self-defensive
reflex"(p. 92). One
outcome of the committee's work was a Declaration
against Racism and Xenophobia made public in I986
(EuropeanParliamenti986). In I989 the Parliamentset
5. Scholarshavenotedincreasingly
frequent
reference
to xenophobia. Becausehostilitytowardimmigrants
is, in practice,selective,
Taguieff(i987:337, my translation),
forexample,has arguedfor
the Frenchcase that"in sum, the xenophobicattitudeindicates
onlya limit;it nevermanifests
itselfin a strictsense(as therejectionoftheforeigner
as such)butresultsfroma moreorless explicit
hierarchy
ofrejectedgroups.Itis nota rejectionofthe'other'which
does not chooseamongits 'others'and does notpresupposea set
ofvalueswhichauthorizediscrimination.
Anyxenophobiain this
sense constitutesa latentracism,a nascentracism"(Enfinl'attitudex6nophoben'indiquequ'une limite,elle ne se manifestejamais au sens strict(rejetde l'6tranger
commetel),mais proc6de
d'unehierarchie
plusou moinsexplicitedesgroupesrejet6s.Il n'est
pas de rejectde "l'autre"qui ne s6lectionneparmises "autres,"et
ne sous-entende
une 6chellede valeursautorisantla discrimination.Toutex6nophobie
esten ce sensun racismelatent,un racisme
also disagrees(pp.8o-8 i) with
therefore
a l'6tatnaissant).Taguieff
Levi-Strauss's
celebratedthoughcontroversial
distinction
between
ethnocentrism
as a universalattitudeofculturalself-preservation
and racismas a doctrinethatjustifiesoppression
and creativity
and exploitation,
whichgainednew prominence
in theFrenchdebate overimmigration.
Othershave also interpreted
xenophobic
claimsas a second-levelracistdiscourse(LangmuirI978:i82 and
Delacampagne i983:42-43, cited by TaguieffI987:79-80, 5og). For
a critiqueof Levi-Strauss's
culturalrelativismsee Geertz(I986).
More recently,Todorov (i989:8i-io9) has taken Levi-Strauss to
taskforradicalrelativismand extremeculturaldeterminism.
See
also Levi-Strauss (I994:42o-26).
forexample,has asked in a
6. B6jin (i986:306, my translation),
critiqueof antiracists,"Whyhas this naturaland even healthy
in Europein recentyears
whichhas beengenerated
ethnocentrism
It is the antiraciststhemproducedexpressionsof exasperation?
selveswho provideus withan adequate,even obviousanswerto
this questionwhen theyinsistthat allegedly'racist'politicians
6
CURRENT
ANTHROPOLOGY
Volume 36, Number i, FebruaryI995
affinityof its argumentwith key postulates of human
ethologyand sociobiologyhave been noted repeatedly
(BarkerI98I: chap. 5; Duranton-CrabolI988:44, 7 I-8I).
The scientificweaknesses of notions of human nature
imbased on biologicalprinciplessuch as the territorial
perativeand the tribalinstinct,accordingto which humans no less than animals have a natural tendencyto
formbounded social groups and for the sake of their
themselvesfromand to be
own survivalto differentiate
hostile to outsidershave been reiterated(see, e.g., Sahlins I976, Rose, Lewontin, and Kamin I984, Gould
The point here is, however,to show why a belief
i98i).
in Homo xenophobicus has so much commonsenseappeal.
Strikingin that it suggests that this assumption is
not restrictedto the scientificor political rightis, for
example, Cohn-Benditand Schmid's (I99I:5, my translation)recentargumentthat"the indignationoverxenophobia (Fremdenhass),which suggestsas an antidotea
policyof open borders,is somehow false and dangerous.
Forifhistoryhas taughtus one thing,thenit is this: in
no societyhas a civil intercoursewith foreignersbeen
inbred.Much indicates thatthereservevis-a'-vistheforeigner constitutesan anthropologicalconstant of the
species: and modernitywith its growingmobilityhas
made this problem more general than it was before."7
This claim is as politicallydangerousas it is scientifically debatable, for history,by contrast,for example,
with biology,is unable to prove human universals,at
least as far as our contemporaryunderstandingof the
human experience goes. Besides, it is not difficultto
the fallacyofthe
come up with examplesdemonstrating
idea that xenophobia is part of the human condition.
The war in Bosnia providesprobablythemosttragiccontemporaryinstance. Until Serbian radical nationalism
tore them apart,Muslims, Serbs,and Croats had lived
togetheras neighborsin their acknowledgedreligious
and otherculturaldifferences.
Xenophobia,an attitude supposedlyinherentin human nature,constitutesthe ideologicalunderpinningof
cultural fundamentalismand accounts forpeople's alleged tendencyto value theirown culturesto the exclusion of any other and thereforebe incapable of living
side by side. Contemporaryculturalfundamentalismis
based, then,on two conflatedassumptions:that different culturesare incommensurableand that,because humans are inherentlyethnocentric,relations between
culturesare by "nature" hostile. Xenophobiais to cultat dieses Problemallgegenwartiger
gemachtals zuvor.Werdies
leugnet,arbeitetderAngstvordemFremdenund den aggressiven
nichtentgegen."Cohn-Bendit
Potentialen,
die in ihrschlummern,
Affairs
ofthecity
is thehead oftheDepartmentofMulticultural
ofFrankfurt,
and Schmidis his assistant.This articlewas written
in supportof a shiftin immigration
policyby the Greenstoward
a systemofimmigration
quotas(see also Cohn-Bendit
and Schmid
experiencean increasein theiraudiencesunderconditionsand in
regionswherethereis a strong,important,
and, in the eventof i992 fora more careful argument).Enzensberger(I992:I3-I4, my
emphasisadded)has similarlyarguedthat"everymiapathyon thepartofthe'corpssocial,'irreversible
influxofimmi- translation,
itbe voluntary
independent
ofitscauses,itsaims,whether
grantsofextra-European
I presume gration,
origin.Theythusacknowledge,
involuntarily,
thatthisexasperation
is a reactionof defenseby a or involuntary,and its magnitude,leads to conflicts.Group
constants
and xenophobiaconstituteanthropological
community
whichsensesthatitsidentity
is threatened,
a reaction selfishness
whichpresentsanalogieswiththe resistancethisor thatoccupa- whichprecede any rationalization.Theiruniversalitysuggests
tionbyforeign
armedforceshas provokedin thepast.This rejec- thattheyare olderthananyknownformofsociety.Ancientsociin orderto contain
tionmighteven,ifinternational
tensionsintensify,
becomemore etiesinventedtaboosand ritualsofhospitality
bloodbaths,to allow fora modicum
in a moreirrevers- them,to preventrecurrent
profound
as immigrants
concentrate,
modifying
betweendifferent
clans,tribes,
iblewaya country's
identitythanwouldoccupationforces,which of exchangeand communication
These measuresdo not,however,eliminatethestatus
do not intendto settleand reproduce"(Pourquoicet ethnocen- ethnicities.
it. The guestis
theyinstitutionalize
trismenaturelet meme sain s'est-iltraduit,au coursdes ann6es of alien. On the contrary,
fuhrt
zu Konflikten,
unabr6centesen Europe,pardes manifestations
Ce sont sacredbutmaynotstay"(JedeMigration
d'exasp6ration?
les antiracistes
eux-memesqui nous donnentla r6ponsead6quate, hangigdavon,wodurchsie ausgelostwird,welcheAbsichtihrzugeschiehtund
d'ailleurs6vidente,a cettequestionquand ils soulignentque les grundeliegt, ob sie freiwilligoder unfreiwillig
und Fremdenpoliticienssuppos6s'racistes'voientleuraudiences'accroitre
dans welchenUmfangsie annimmt.Gruppenegoismus
die jederBegriindung
vorKonstanten,
les conjonctures
et les r6gionsoii s'estproduitun brutal,important hass sindanthropologische
sprichtdafiir,dass sie alter
et-en cas d'apathiedu corpssocial-irr6versibleaffluxd'immi- ausgehen.IhreuniverselleVerbreitung
Um sie einzudamgr6sd'origineextra-europeenne.
Ils reconnaissent
ainsi,involon- sind als alle bekanntenGesellschaftsformen.
ein
tairement
je suppose,que cetteexasp6ration
est une reactionde men, um dauerndeBlutbaderzu vermeiden,um uAberhaupt
defensed'une communaut6qui percoitson identit6commemen- Minimumvon Austauschund Verkehrzwischenverschiedenen
haben altertiumliche
ac6e,r6actionqui pr6sentedesanalogiesavecla r6sistance
que telle Clans, Stammen,Ethnienzu ermoglichen,
die Tabus und RitualederGastfreundschaft
erfunou telle occupationpar des forcesarm6es6trangeres
a pu susciter Gesellschaften
hebendenStatusdes Fremdenabernicht
dansle pass6.Ce rejetpourraitmeme,sui devaients'exacerber
les den.Diese Vorkehrungen
tensionsinternationales,
s'avererplus profonddans la mesureoii auf.Sie schreibenihn ganz im Gegenteilfest.Der Gast ist heilig,
whatcan
des immigr6squi fontsouche modifientplus irr6mediablementaberer darfnichtbleiben.)Anotherway ofnaturalizing
determined
attitudesbyuniversalizing
l'identit6d'un paysque des occupantsqui ne cherchent
pas a s'y be shownto be historically
A Britishwriterdefinesxenophobia themconsistsin arguingthatracismis universal.Thus Todorov
enracineret s'y reproduire).
as "a dislike for foreignersor outsiders . . . an old and familiar
phenomenon in human societies" (Layton-HenryI99I:I69).
(i989:I14,
my translation) has argued that racism as a form of
is
doctrine,
behavior,as opposedto racialismas a pseudoscientific
7. "Die Entrustung
uberdenFremdenhass,
dieals Gegenmittel
eine "an ancientbehaviorand probablya universalone; racialismis a
Politikder schrankenlosoffenenGrenzenempfiehlt,
hat etwas currentofopinionbornin WesternEuropewhoseheydayextends
(Le racismeestun
Denn wenndie Geschichteirgend fromthe i 8thto themiddleofthe2oth century"
scheinheiliges
undGefahrliches.
ancien,et d'extensionprobablement
universelle;le
war je derzivile Um- comportement
etwaslehrt,danndies: KeinerGesellschaft
dass die racialismeest un mouvementd'id6esn6 en Europeoccidentale,
gangmit den Fremdenangeboren.Vieles sprichtdafuir,
Reserveihmgegeniuber
zu den anthropologischen
Konstantender dontla grandep6riodeva du milieu du XVIIIeau milieudu XXe
Mobili- siecle).
Gattunggehort;unddie Modernehatmitihrersteigenden
ST O L C KE
tural fundamentalismwhat the bio-moral concept of
"race" is to racism,namely,the naturalistconstantthat
endows with truthvalue and legitimatesthe respective
ideologies.
Racism versus Cultural Fundamentalism
Talkink Culture | 7
portunityforall in the marketplaceand socioeconomic
inequality-which, ratherthan being an anachronistic
survivalof past times of slaveryand/orEuropean colonial expansionand the ascriptiveorderingof society,is
partand parcel of liberal capitalism (Stolcke I993, FitzpatrickI987).
At different
momentsin historysystemsofinequality
and oppressionhave been rationalizedin distinctways.
Racist doctrines are only one variation of the same
theme, namely, the endeavour to reconcile an idea of
shared humanity with existing formsof domination.
Earlymoderncolonial encounterswith "primitives"intenselyexercised European minds. Initiallyit was not
their "racial" differencewhich haunted the European
imagination but their religious-cum-moraldiversity
which was feltto challenge Christianhegemony.How,
if God had created "man" in his image, could therebe
humans who were not Christians?Nineteenth-century
scientificracism was a new way of justifyingdomination and inequality inspiredby the search fornatural
laws thatwould accountforthe orderin natureand society. Strikingin the igth-centurydebate over the place
ofhumans in natureis the tensionbetweenman's faith
in freewill unencumberedby naturalconstraints,in his
endeavouras a freeagentto masternature,and the tendency to naturalize social man. Social Darwinism, eugenics, and criminologyprovidedthe pseudoscientific
legitimationfor consolidating class inequality. Their
targetswere the dangerouslaboringclasses at home (see,
e.g., Chevalier I984). If the self-determining
individual,
seemed unable to make
throughpersistentinferiority,
the most ofthe opportunitiessocietypurportedto offer,
it had to be because of some essential,inherentdefect.
The personor,better,his or hernaturalendowment-be
it called racial, sexual, innate talent,or intelligenceratherthanthe prevailingsocioeconomicor political orderwas to be blamed forthis. This rationalefunctioned
both as a powerfulincentiveforindividualeffortand to
disarm social discontent.Physical anthropologyat the
same time lent supportboth to claims of national supremacyamong European nations and to the colonial
enterpriseby establishinga hierarchyofbio-moralraces
A systematiccomparisonof the conceptual structures
of traditionalracism and this culturalfundamentalism
may renderclearerthe distinctnessof what are alternative doctrinesof exclusion.8They have in common that
theyaddressthe contradictionbetweenthe modernuniversalistnotion that all humans are naturallyequal and
freeand multipleformsof sociopolitical discrimination
and exclusion,but theydo so differently.
Bothdoctrines
derivetheirargumentativeforcefromthe same ideological subterfuge,
namely,the presentationof what is the
outcome ofspecificpolitico-economicrelationshipsand
conflictsof interestas natural and hence incontestable
because it, as it were, "comes naturally."
Modern Western racism rationalizes claims of national superiorityor sociopolitical disqualificationand
economic exploitationof groupsof individualswithina
to themcertainmoral,intellectual,
polityby attributing
or social defectssupposedlygroundedin their "racial"
endowmentwhich,by virtueof being innate,are inevitable. The markersinvokedto identifya "race" may be
phenotypicalor constructed.Racism thus operateswith
a particularistic criterion of classification, namely,
"race," which challengesthe claim to equal humanness
by dividinghumankindinto inherentlydistinctgroups
orderedhierarchically,one groupmakinga claim to exclusive superiority.
In this sense racistdoctrinesare categorical, concealing the sociopolitical relationships
whichgeneratethehierarchy."Race" is construedas the
necessaryand sufficientnatural cause of the unfitness
of "others" and hence of theirinferiority.
Sociopolitical
inequalityand dominationare therebyattributedto the
criterionofdifferentiation
itself,namely,"their"lack of
worth,which is in "their" race. As a doctrineof asymmetric classificationracism provokes counterconcepts
that demean the "other" as the "other" could not de- (Blanckaert
I988; Brubaker
i992:98-io2).
mean the "self." Mutual recognitionis deniedprecisely
Cultural fundamentalism,by contrast,assumes a set
because the "racial" defect,beingrelative,is not shared ofsymmetriccounterconcepts,thatofthe foreigner,
the
by the "self." And that is the point. By attributingun- stranger,the alien as opposed to the national, the citiequal status and treatmentto its victim's own inherent zen. Humans by theirnatureare bearersof culture.But
shortcomings,this doctrinedenies the ideological char- humanityis composed of a multiplicityof distinctculacterof racism itself.
tures which are incommensurable,the relations beOf course, this raises the importantquestion of the tween theirrespectivemembersbeing inherentlyconplace of an idea of social status inscribed in nature, flictivebecause it is in human natureto be xenophobic.
ratherthan resultingfromcontract,in modernsociety, An alleged human universal-people's natural propenotherwiseconceived of as composed of self-determining sityto rejectstrangers-accountsforculturalparticularindividualsborn equal and free.Modern racism consti- ism. The apparentcontradiction,in the modernliberal
forreconcilingthe democraticethos, between the invocation of a shared
tutes an ideological sleight-of-hand
irreconcilable-a liberal meritocraticethos of equal op- humanitywhich involves an idea of generalityso that
no human being seems to be excluded and culturalparticularismtranslatedinto national terms is overcome
analysisofpolitical ideologically:a cultural "other," the immigrantas for8. I drawhereon Koselleck's(i985) important
counterconcepts.
eigner. alien. and as such a notentin1 "enemv" who
8
CURRENT
ANTHROPOLOGY
Volume 36, Number i, FebruaryI995
threatens"our" national-cum-cultural
uniqueness and prevailingsocioeconomicills withtheway in whichimis constructedout of a traitwhich is shared migrantsas foreignersare conceptualized.Ratherthan
integrity,
by the "self." In yet anotherideological twist,national being thematizeddirectly,immigrants'socioeconomic
identityand belonginginterpreted
as culturalsingularity exclusion is a consequence of theirpolitical exclusion
become an insurmountablebarrierto doingwhat comes (Le temps des exclusions I993). Opponentsof immigranaturallyto humans,in principle,namely,communicat- tion on the rightmay object to grantingimmigrantsthe
ing.
social and politicalrightsinherentin citizenshipon ecoInstead of orderingdifferentcultures hierarchically, nomic grounds.The "problem" of immigrationis conculturalfundamentalismsegregatesthemspatially,each strued,however,as a political threatto nationalidentity
culturein its place. The factthatnation-statesare by no and integrityon account of immigrants'culturaldivermeans culturallyuniformis ignored.Localized political sitybecause the nation-stateis conceivedas foundedon
communitiesare regardedby definitionas culturallyho- a bounded and distinctcommunitywhich mobilizes a
mogeneous. Presumed inherentxenophobic propensi- shared sense of belongingand loyaltypredicatedon a
ties-though they challenge the supposed territorial common language,culturaltraditions,and beliefs.In a
rootingof culturalcommunities,since theyare directed context of economic recession and national retrenchagainst strangers"in our midst"-reterritorializecul- ment, appeals to primordial loyalties fall on fertile
tures. Their targetsare uprootedstrangerswho fail to groundbecause of the ordinarytaken-for-granted
sense
assimilate culturally.
of national belonging that is the common idiom of
Being symmetrical,these categoriesare logically re- contemporary
political self-understanding
(WeberI976,
versible-anynational is a foreignerto any othernation cited by Brubakeri992).
in a world of nation-states,forto possess a nationality
Immigrantsare seen as threateningto bringabout a
is in the natureof things.This formalconceptualpolar- "crisis of citizenship" (Leca I992:3I4)9 in both a juridiity-nationals as againstforeigners-ischargedwithpo- cal and a politico-ideologicalsense. In the modernworld
liticalmeaning.Bymanipulatingthe ambiguouslink be- nationalityas the preconditionforcitizenshipis inhertween national belonging and cultural identity,the entlybounded as an instrumentand an object of social
notion of xenophobia infusesthe relationshipbetween closure (Brubakeri992).10 In this respect,nationalityis
thetwo categorieswith a specificand substantivepoliti- not all that different
fromthe kinship principlesthat
cal content.Because the propensityto dislike strangers operatedin so-called primitivesocieties to definegroup
is sharedbyforeigners,
it also becomes legitimateto fear membership.In the modernworld of nation-states,nathat the latter,by theirdisloyalty,mightthreatenthe tionality,citizenship,culturalcommunity,and stateare
national community.When the "problem"posed by ex- conflatedideologically(Beaud and Noiriel I99I:276) and
tracommunitarianimmigration is conceptualized in endow immigrants'cultural distinctivenesswith symtermsof self-evidentculturaldifference
and incommen- bolic and political meaning.
surability,the root causes of immigration,namely,the
It will, of course,be objectedthat not all immigrants
deepening effectsof North-Southinequality, are ex- or foreignersare treatedwith animosity.This is obviplained away.
are not abously true.But then,equality and difference
Culturalfundamentalisminvokesa conceptionofcul- solute categories.The politico-ideologicalrepertoireon
turecontradictorily
inspiredbothbytheuniversalistEn- which the modernnation-stateis built providesthe raw
lightenmenttraditionand by the Germanromanticism materialsfromwhich culturalfundamentalismis conthat marked much of the igth-centurynationalistde- structed.Specificpowerrelationshipswiththecountries
bate. Bybuildingits case fortheexclusionofimmigrants from which extracommunitarianimmigrantsproceed
on a trait shared by all humans alike ratherthan on and the exploitationtheyhave undergoneexplain why
an unfitnessallegedlyintrinsicto extracommunitarians, "they" ratherthan, forexample, North Americans are
culturalfundamentalism,by contrastwith racist theo- the targetsin Europe of this rhetoricof exclusion. Hosries, has a certain openness which leaves room forre- tilityagainstextracommunitarian
immigrantsmayhave
quiringimmigrants,iftheywish to live in our midst,to racistovertones,and metaphorscan certainlybe mixed.
assimilate culturally.And because of the otherimpor- Yet, as somebodyremarkedto me recently,immigrants
tant idea in modernWesternpolitical culture,namely, carrytheirforeignnessin theirfaces. Phenotypetends
thatall humans are equal and free,anti-immigrant
rhet- now to be employed as a markerof immigrantorigin
oric is polemical and open to challenge,which is why ratherthan "race's" being construedas the justification
existingformsof exclusion, inequality,and oppression foranti-immigrant
resentment.
need to be rationalizedideologically.
At the core of this ideology of collective exclusion
predicatedon the idea of the "other" as a foreigner,a
twowaysofdefining
nationality
as a prerequistranger,to the bodypolitic is the assumptionthatfor- 9. Leca distinguishes
mal political equalitypresupposesculturalidentityand site forcitizenship,namely,in "biological"and in "contractual"
does notpursuethepolitico-ideological
imterms,butregrettably
hence culturalsameness is the essentialprerequisitefor plications
ofthesedistinctmodalities.
access to citizenshiprights.One should not confusethe io. Brubakerrightlyremarkson the surprising
absenceofstudies
useful social functionof immigrantsas scapegoats for ofthemodernconceptofcitizenshipin the social sciences.
STOLCKE
Talking Culture I 9
FrenchRepublican Assimilationversus
BritishEthnic Integration
nalize a more or less exclusive idea of the nation and of
citizenship.A comparisonofFrenchand Britishpostwar
experiencesand treatmentsof the immigration"probFor the sake of clarityI have so farneglectedmajor dif- lem" will serve to make this point (see Lapeyronnie
interpretation).
ferencesin dealing with the immigration"problem" I993 fora different
The Frenchdebateoverimmigrationsince the seventamongEuropeancountrieswhich have been pointedout
repeatedly
(WieviorkaI993; RoulandI993:I6-I7;
La- ies reveals the ambivalence underlyingthe Republican
peyronnieI993). "It is an almost universal activityof assimilationist conception of nationalityand citizenthemodernstateto regulatethemovementofthepeople ship. The firstgenuine Frenchnationalitycode was enpredominantly
across its national boundaries" (Evans I983:4), but this acted in I889, at a time when foreigners,
origin,had a
Portuguese
Italian,
and
Polish,
of
Belgian,
can be done in diverseways. The Dutch and the British
with Gerin
the
country,
by
contrast
large
presence
governmentswere the firstto acknowledgethepresence
in theircountriesof so-called ethnicminorities.By the many,and drew a sharpline betweennationals and forthe jus sanguinis, thatis, deeightiesall WesternEuropeanstateswere curbingimmi- eigners.12It consecrated
French
father
(sic) and, in the case of an
from
a
scent
grationand attemptingto integrateimmigrantsalready
mother,
as the firstcriterion
from
the
child,
illegitimate
in theirmidst.Dependingon theirpolitical culturesand
histories,different
countriesdesignedtheirimmigration of access to Frenchnationality,but simultaneouslyit
The Frenchmodel, informedby the reinforcedthe principleof jus soli, accordingto which
policies differently.
bornon Frenchsoil were automattraditionalRepublicanformulaofassimilationand civic childrenofforeigners
I38-42; see also
I992:94-II3,
French
(Brubaker
ically
contrastedsharplywith the Anglo-Saxon
incorporation,
one, which leftroom forculturaldiversity,althoughby Noiriel I988:8I-84). The relativeprominencegiven to
the eightiesa confluencecould be detectedbetweenthe jus soli in the code has been interpretedas a "liberal,"
two countries' anti-immigrant
rhetoricand restrictive inclusive solution (Noiriel I988:83; Brubakeri992). On
closerinspectionthis combinationof descentand birthpolicies.
however,as a clever
The entryand settlementof immigrantsin Europe place rules can also be interpreted,
poses again the question ofwhat constitutesthemodern compromisestruckformilitaryand ideological reasons
overAlsace-Lorraine
nation-stateand what are conceivedas the prerequisites (in the contextofthe confrontation
foraccess to nationalityas the preconditionforcitizen- followingthe Frenchdefeatin the Franco-GermanWar
ship. Three criteria-descent (jus sanguinis),birthplace and the establishmentof the German Empire)between
(jus soli), and domicile combined with diverse proce- an organicist and a voluntarist conception which,
were intrinsicto the Frenchconduresof "naturalization"(note the term)-have usually thoughcontradictory,
been wielded to determineentitlementto nationalityin ceptionof the nation-state.
The nationalitycode of I889 did not apply to the
the modernnation-states.[us sanguinis constitutesthe
colonies until Frenchcitizenshipwas extended
French
most exclusive principle.The prioritygivenhistorically
colonial
territoriesafterWorld War II (Werner
to
all
to one or anothercriterionhas dependednot only,however, on demographic-economicand/or military cir- I935). As soon as Algeriagainedits independence,howwhile inhabitantsof
cumstancesand interestsbut also on conceptionsofthe ever,Algeriansbecame foreigners,
and territoriesrethe
French
overseas
departments
national communityand the substantialties of nationentryinto France.
with
right
of
French,
mained
fully
hood. The classical opposition between the French
Staatsnation and the German Kulturnation(Meinecke Those Algerianswho were livingin France at indepenI919;
Guiomari99o:i26-3o) has oftenobscuredthees- dence had to opt forFrenchor Algeriancitizenship.For
sentialist nationalism present also in i gth-century obvious political reasons most of them rejectedFrench
Frenchthoughtand debate on nationhoodand national nationality,though their French-bornchildrencontinidentityand hence the part played by the Republican ued to be definedas Frenchat birth,as were the Frenchformulaof assimilationin the Frenchconceptionof the born children of the large numbers of immigrantsto
Republic." There has been almost fromthe starta ten- Francein the decade followingthe war ofindependence
sion between a democratic,voluntarist,and an organi- (Weil i988). By the midseventies the regulation of
cist conceptionofbelongingin the continentalEuropean Frenchnationalityand citizenshipbecame inseparable
model-by contrastwith the Britishtradition-of the fromimmigrationpolicy.As opinion grewmorehostile
modernnation-statewhich,dependingon historicalcir- toward immigrants,especially fromNorth Africa,the
cumstances,has been drawnon to formulateand ratio- jus soli came underincreasingattackfromthe rightfor
into Frenchmenon paperwithoutenturningforeigners
as
between"ethnicmoments"(understood
i i. By distinguishing
Frenchformoments"in igth-century
racist)and "assimilationist
mulationsofnationalitylaw, Brubaker(i992:esp. chap. 5), in his
studyofcitizenshipin France
comparative
otherwiseinformative
assumptionon which
thefundamentalist
disregards
andGermany,
idea rests,namely,thatformallegal equality
the assimilationist
amongcitizenspresupposesculturalhomogeneity.
duringthegloriI 2. The termetrangerhad alreadybeenintroduced
totherevoluto designatepoliticalenemies,traitors
ous revolution
tionarycause-the Frenchnobilityplottingagainstthepatriotes
to reimposeroyalrulein
and the Britishsuspectedof conspiring
to thenation
Paris.This associationoftheetrangerwithdisloyalty
has been especiallypowerfulin timesofwar (WahnichI988).
IO I CURRENT
ANTHROPOLOGY
Volume 36, Number i, FebruaryI995
suringthattheywere "Frenchat heart" (Brubakeri992:
I43). A controversialcitizenshiplaw reformsubmitted
in I983 and designedto abolish the automatic acquisition of French nationalityby French-bornchildrenof
immigrants,requiringan explicit declaration instead,
was neverthelessdefeatedin I986 because of strongopposition to the traditionalFrench assimilationistconception by proimmigrantorganizationsand the left.In
the new conservative governmentfinally sucI993
ceeded,however,in passinga reformto the same effect,
which restrictsthe jus soli rule, therebygiving new
prominenceto jus sanguinis.13
Until the mideightiesthe antiracistmovement and
proimmigrantorganizationsin France had advocated a
multiculturalistmodel of integrationbased on respect
for immigrants'cultural diversity,respondingthus to
the right'sculturalfundamentalism.The heated debate
over immigrants'"right to difference"was typically
French.'4Thereafterprogressiveopinionbegan to swing
around,callingfor"a returnto the old republicantheme
of integrationaccordingto which membershipin the
nation is based not on an identitybut on citizenship,
which consistsin individualadherenceto certainminimal but precise universal values" (Dossier I99I:4748).15The "republicanmodel ofintegration"which conditions citizenship on shared cultural values and
demands cultural assimilation became the progressive
political alternativeto the right'sculturalfundamentalism.16
Britishimmigrationdebate and experiencedeveloped
quite differently.
Accordingto the traditionalnationalitylaw of England,later extendedto Britain,everyperson born within the domain of its king was a British
subject. Nineteenth-centuryFrench advocates of jus
sanguinishad alreadyrejectedas inappropriatethe British unconditionaljus soli rule because forthemcitizenship reflectedan enduringand substantialratherthan
merelyaccidental connection to France as well as the
will to belongand because of its expansivenessand feu-
dal roots(Brubaker
i992:90).
Butthemeaningand con-
sequences ofjural normsdependon theirhistoricalcontext. The traditional British concept of subjecthood
based on birthon Britishsoil, which establishedan individual verticalbond of allegiance to the crown and its
parliament,unaltereduntil i962, allowed immigrants
fromthe colonies freeentryinto the countryas British
subjectsregardlessoftheirculturaland/orphenotypical
The Home Office(quoted by Segal i99i:9)
difference.'7
arguedin the I930S as follows:
it is a matterof fundamentalimportanceboth for
the United Kingdomand forthe Empireas a whole,
if thereis to be such an organizationat all based in
the last resorton a common sentimentof cohesion
which exists,but cannot be created,that all British
subjects should be treatedon the same basis in the
United Kingdom.... It is to the advantageof the
United Kingdomthat personsfromall partsof the
Empireare attractedto it.
imDespite postwarconcernsoverfreeand unrestricted
migration'sloweringthe quality of the Britishpeople
(DummettandNicol I990:I74),
theBritishNationality
Bill of I948 ruled thatBritishsubjecthoodwas acquired
byvirtueofbeinga citizenofa countryofthe Commonwealth.Yet, as largenumbersofimmigrantsarrivedand
demandsforcontrolincreased,the CommonwealthImmigrantsAct of i962 introducedthe firstspecial immigration controls. It did not explicitly discriminate
againstnonwhiteimmigrants,but it lefta largeamount
of discretionfor immigrationofficersto select immigrantsat a time when it went withoutsayingthatCommonwealthimmigrantswere not white (Dummett and
Nicol 1990:183-87; Segal i99i:9). In I98I, finally,
the
Conservativegovernmentpassed theBritishNationality
Act, which broughtnationalitylaw in line with immigrationpolicy and limitedthe ancientunconditionaljus
I 3. It shouldbe notedthat CharlesPasqua, the GaullistFrench
who drafted
ministeroftheinterior
thereform,
was also a staunch soli, concluding the process of "alienation" of New
theminto
andEuropeanpoliticalinte- Commonwealthimmigrantsby transforming
opponentoftheMaastrichtagreement
grationduringthe campaignin Franceforits approvalby referendum.Pasqua explainedhis oppositionby arguingrevealingly,
"In
France,the rightto vote is inseparablefromcitizenshipand this
fromnationality.
Thereare 5 millionforeigners
here,I.5 million
ofthemcommunitarians.
Ourcommunitarian
guestsarewelcome,
butwe arenotwillingto shareournationalsovereignty
withthem.
Franceis an exceptionalpeopleand not an amalgamoftribes"(El
Pais, September I4, I992, P. 4). The Euro-sceptics in the British
Conservative
partyaresimilarlyconcernedwithEuropeanintegration'schallenging
Britishsovereignty.
aliens(EvansI983:46; Dummettand Nicol I990:238-
5 '). Those who had been hostilizedearlieras "black subjects" are now excluded as "cultural aliens."''8
RegiliberalToryhomesecretary
I 7. In thelate sixtiestheformer
arguedthat"while one talkedalways
nald Mauldingrevealingly
betweenblack
abouttheneed to avoiddiscrimination
and rightly
and whiteit is a simplefactofhumannaturethatfortheBritish
betweenAustraliansand New
I4. Guillaumin (1i992:89) points to an importantpolitical distinc- people thereis a greatdifference
tionbetweenclaiming" a rightto difference,"
whichimpliesan Zealanders,forexample,who come ofBritishstock,andpeopleof
forauthorization
appealbyimmigrants
bythestateto be different Africa,the Caribbean,and the Indian Sub-Continentwho are
fromnationals,by contrastwithpostulating"the rightof differ- equallysubjectsoftheQueen and entitledto totalequalitybefore
the law when establishedhere,but who in appearance,habits,
ence,"whichassumesa universal,inherentright.
fromus. The problem
I5. This dossierprovidesextensivecoverageofthe Frenchdebate religionand cultureweretotallydifferent
withthe
on immigrationfroman assimilationistperspective.See also of balancingthe moralprincipleof non-discrimination
"Quels discourssur l'immigration?"
(i988) foran earlier,con- practicalfactsofhumannaturewas not an easyone,and thedanviewwhichfocusescriticallyon thereform
ofFrenchna- gersthatarisefrommistakesofpolicyin thisfieldwereveryreal
trasting
indeed"(quotedbyEvans i983:2I, myemphasis).
tionalitylaw in theeighties.
a Ministry
ofRepatriation
i6. In I99I the socialistgovemmentset up a Ministryof Social i8. In I969 EnochPowellwas proposing
as "aliens"in theculimmigrants
to Commonwealth
and a StateSecretariat
Affairs
and ofIntegration
forIntegration
to andreferring
turalsense (Dummettand Nicol i990:i96).
promote immigrants'assimilation (Perrotiand Th6paut i99i:io2).
STOLCKE
Britain'scommon law traditionand the absence of a
code of citizenshiprightshad providedspace forimmigrantsubjects' culturalvalues and needs. Tolerance for
culturaldiversityformedpart of the historyof Britain,
acknowledgedas a multiculturalpolity,untilin the late
seventiesan English-centric
reinventionof that history
began to prevail (Kearneyi99I;
Clark I99Ia, b). This
does not mean thatBritain'spostwarimmigrationexperience was not beset with social conflict. Antiimmigrantsentimentwas alive and aggressionswere
frequent,but theywere racist. Until the late seventies
the controversyover immigrationwas predominantly
phrasedin racist terms.As Dummett and Nicol (I990:
2I3)19 have pointedout,
Talking Culture I i
Immigrantchildrenwere to receivestandardEnglisheducation,and uniformlegal treatmentwas to be accorded
them(ParekhI99i).
Thus as Europeevolvedintoa su-
pranationalpolity,a continentalnation-stateparadoxically emergedout of the ashes of the Britishmulticulturalthoughracist empire.
The Nation within the State
As I indicatedearlier,the debateoverimmigrants'"right
to difference"unleashed singular passions in France.
The characterand reasonsforthiscontroversy
transcend
the polarized political climate over the immigration
"problem." They express a historicaltension inherent
Justas the advocates of strictimmigrationcontrol
in the FrenchuniversalistRepublicanconceptionofthe
were exclusivelyconcernedwith non-whiteimmigra- modern nation-state.In a world of emergingnationtion,so the supportersof liberalisationattackedrastates,the early cosmopolitanrevolutionaryspiritwas
cial discriminationfirstand foremostand perceived
soon erodedby a crucial dilemma,namely,how to build
a nation-stateendowedwith a distinctand boundedcitiimmigrationpolicy as the drivingforcebehind this
were,in principle,alien
discrimination.It had become psychologicallyimpos- zenry.Ethnicgroupdifferences
sible forboth sides to thinkof "immigration"in any to the revolutionarydemocraticpoint of view. But, as
sense, or any context,except as a verbal convention Hobsbawm(I990:I9, see also CranstonI988:IOI) has
forreferring
identifiedthe problem,
to the race situationin Britain.
The equation nation = state = people, and especially sovereignpeople, undoubtedlylinked nation
since structureand definitionof states
to territory,
were now essentiallyterritorial.It also implied a
multiplicityof nation-statesso constituted,and this
was indeed a necessaryconsequence of popularselfdetermination.... But it said little about what constituted"the people." In particulartherewas no logical connectionbetween a body of citizens of a
territorialstate,on one hand, and the identification
of a "nation" on ethnic,linguisticor othergrounds
or of othercharacteristicswhich allowed collective
recognitionof groupmembership.
Legal provisions to combat discriminationtypically
aimed at ensuringsubjects fromthe ex-colonies equal
opportunitiesindependentof their"race."20As long as
immigrantsfromthe ex-colonies were Britishsubjects
theywerefellowcitizens,albeit consideredas ofan inferiorkind. Anti-immigrant
prejudiceand discrimination
were rationalizedin classical racistterms.Formallegal
equality was not deemed incompatible with immiculturaltraditionsas longas thesetradigrants'different
tions did not infringebasic human rights.The right's
demandforculturalassimilationconstituteda minority
opinion.Liberals defendedintegrationwith due respect
forcultural diversityand the particularneeds of "ethnic" minorities.A key instrumentof liberalintegration
policy was multiculturaleducation. As I have shown
above, when the Tory governmenttook up the banner
of curbingimmigrationit began to rationalizeit, invoking,by contrastwith earlierracist arguments,nationalcum-culturalunityand callingforthe culturalassimilation of immigrant communities "in our midst" to
safeguardtheBritish"nation" withits sharedvalues and
lifestyle.Immigrantcommunitiesneeded to be broken
up so thattheirmembers,once isolated,would cease to
pose a culturaland political threatto the Britishnation.
The advocates of an idea of the "nation" based on a
freelyenteredcontractamongsovereigncitizensusually
invoke Renan's celebratedmetaphor"The existence of
a nationis a plebisciteofeveryday." Renan's "Qu'est-ce
qu'unenation?"(i992 [i882])21 is in factoftentakenfor
the expressionofa conceptionofthe nationparticularly
well suitedto moderndemocraticindividualism.22
They
tend to overlook,however,that Renan simultaneously
uses another culturalist argumentto resolve the difficultyof how to circumscribethe "population" or
on "racerelations"is another
Britishliterature
I 9. The voluminous
indicationoftheprominenceofracismin relationto immigrants.
in publicplaces,housing,and
2o. To outlawracialdiscrimination
passed a series of
successiveBritishgovernments
employment,
Race RelationsActsin I965, I968, and I976 (DummettandNicol
Parekhi99i). The I976 Race Relations
I990, Layton-Henry
I99I,
Act repealedearlierlaws and createdthe CommissionforRacial
the
forimplementing
bodyresponsible
Equality,an administrative
I980,
policieslaid downin theact (Lustgarten
equal opportunities
and SolomosI987, Walkerand RedmanI977).
Jenkins
2i. It is important
to notethatRenanwrotethisessayat thetime
conflictoverAlsace-Lorraine,
of the Franco-German
claimedby
on thegroundsthatitspopulationwas ofGermanculture
Germany
and spoketheGermanlanguage.
22. It is worthnotingherethatLouisDumontis amongthosewho
elementsin Renanwhenhe contrasts
haveneglectedtheorganicist
thatscholar'swritingswiththoseofHerderand Fichteand goes
on to establishan unwarrantedly
sharpoppositionbetweenFrench
voluntaristtheoryand the Germanethnicconception(Dumont
I979; also i99i).
CURRENT
I1
ANTHROPOLOGY
Volume 36, Number i, FebruaryI995
"people" entitled to partake in this plebiscite (i992
L-QQQ1
Conclusion
A.c
To conclude,let me now returnto the tasks and tribulations of anthropology.Social and culturalanthropology
have had a privilegedrelationshipwith cultureand culturnin the
The critical,self-reflexive
tural differences.
has rightlycalled into quespast decade in anthropology
tion the political and theoreticalimplications of the
boundednessand isolation of cultures
taken-for-granted
in classical ethnographicrealism. There is no longera
generallyaccepted view of cultures as relativelyfixed
and integratedsystemsof sharedvalues and meanings.
Enhanced"postmodern"awarenessofculturalcomplexities and cultural politics and of the situatedness of
knowledge in poststructuralistanthropologyentails,
Two contradictorycriteria,one political (freeconsent) however, a paradox. Despite pronouncementsto the
and one cultural (a shared past), are thus constitutive contrary,"culture critique," no less than the cultural
mode, by necessitypresupposesthe sepconstructionist
ofthe"nation"(TodorovI989:I65-26i; NoirielI9:27function- arateness of cultures and their boundedness (Kahn
28; see also Gellner i987:6-28 fora different,
alist interpretationand, fora wittytake-offon French I989).24 Only because thereare "other"ways ofmaking
in sense of the world can "we" pretendto relativize"our
GattyI 99 3). Renan's difficulty
republicanmythology,
Similarly,when a
definingthe "nation" in purelycontractual,consensual own" cultural self-understandings.
termsis just one illustrationof a fundamentaldilemma systematicknowledgeof "others" as much as of "ourthathas beset continentalEuropeanstate building.The selves" is deemedimpossible,thisis so because "we" no
"principle of nationality,"which identifiedthe state, less than "others" are culture-bound.Thus, the present
ends up bypostulating
the people, and the law with an ideal vision of society culturalistmood in anthropology
as culturallyhomogeneous and integrated,became the a world of reifiedcultural differences(see Gupta and
novel, though unstable, formof legitimationin igth- Fergusoni992, Keesing I994, TurnerI993). Parallelsbetween this and culturalfundamentalism,as I have anacenturystrugglesforstate formation.
Contemporarycultural fundamentalismunequivo- lyzed it above, should make us beware of the dangers,
understandingbetween peoples, of a new
cally roots nationalityand citizenshipin a shared cul- forfurthering
tural heritage.Though new with regardto traditional sortof culturalrelativism.
ways
racism,it is also old, forit draws forits argumentative Not fora moment do I mean to deny different
systems
forceon this contradictoryigth-centuryconceptionof of organizingthe business of life and different
the modernnation-state.The assumptionthatthe terri- ofmeaning.Humans have, however,always been on the
torialstate and its people are foundedon a culturalheri- move, and cultureshave provedfluidand flexible.The
tagethatis bounded,compact,and distinctis a constitu- new global order,in which bothold and new boundaries,
tive part of this, but thereis also, as I have argued,an farfrombeing dissolved,are becomingmore active and
important conceptual difference.Nineteenth-century exclusive, poses formidablenew questions also foranfromthe thropology.A crucial issue that should concernus is,
nationalismreceivedenormousreinforcement
elaboration of one central concept of social theory, then,the circumstancesunderwhich cultureceases to
"race." With heightenedenmitybetweennation-states, be somethingwe need forbeinghuman to become somenationalism was often activated and ratifiedthrough thingthat impedes us fromcommunicatingas human
claims to racial superiorityof the national community. beings. It is not cultural diversityper se that should
Because racistdoctrineshave become politicallydiscred- interest anthropologistsbut the political meanings
ited in the postwarperiod,culturalfundamentalismas with which specificpolitical contextsand relationships
the contemporaryrhetoricof exclusion thematizes,in- endow cultural difference.Peoples become culturally
stead, relations between cultures by reifyingcultural entrenchedand exclusive in contexts where there is
domination and conflict. It is the configurationof
boundariesand difference.
sociopolitical structuresand relationshipsboth within
and between groups that activates differencesand
shapes possibilitiesand impossibilitiesof communicat23. "Une nationest une ame, un principespirituel.Deux choses
cetteame,ce principe ing. In orderto make sense of contemporarycultural
qui, a vraidiren'en fontqu'un,constituent
spirituel.L'une est dansle pass6,l'autredansle pr6sent.L'une est politics in this interconnectedand unequal world,we
relativisms
la possessionen commund'un richelegs de souvenirs;l'autreest need transcendour sometimes self-serving
le consentement
actuel,le d6sirde vivreensemble,la volont6de and methodological uncertaintiesand proceed to exA nation is a soul, a spiritualprinciple.Two things
which in realitymake up no more than one constitute that soul, that spiritualprinciple.One is in the
past, the otherin the present.One is the sharedpossession of a richheritageof memories;the otheris
the presentconsent,the desireto live together,the
will to continueto sustain the heritageone has received undivided.... The nation,the same as the individual,is the realizationof an extendedpast of endeavors,of sacrificeand of devotion.The cult of the
ancestorsis among all the most legitimate;the ancestorshave made us what we are....
continuer a faire valoir l'h6ritage qu'on a recu indivis.
. .
. La
nation,commel'individu,est l'aboutissantd'un longpass6 d'efLe cultedes ancetresest de
forts,de sacrificeset de devouements.
tous les plus 1egitime;ancetresnous ont faitsce que nous som- 24. Kahn,however,commitsthe errorI discussedearlierofinterpretingculturalessentialismas a formofracism.
mes."
ST O L C KE
Talking Culture I I 3
plore,in a creativedialogue with otherdisciplines,"the
Stolcke's comparativeanalysisofthe immigrationde(Gupta and Fergu- bate in Britainand in Franceis useful,and she is original
processesofproductionofdifference"
son I992:I3-I4).
and,I think,accuratein notingtherecentrevivalof "xeGenuine toleranceforculturaldiversitycan flourish nophobia" as an explanatoryterm. She is also surely
withoutentailingdisadvantagesonlywhere societyand correctin declaringthatit has no scientificbasis. Minor
polityare democraticand egalitarianenough to enable weaknessesin an otherwisecloselyarguedpaperemerge
people to resistdiscrimination(whetheras immigrants, in the claim that the "root causes" of immigrationare
with- the deepening"effects"ofNorth-Southinequality(tracwomen,blacks) and developdifferences
foreigners,
out jeopardizingthemselvesand solidarityamongthem. ing the chain of causation back to an abstractionwhich
I wonderwhetherthis is possible withinthe confinesof itselfneeds explanation)and in a somewhat limp conthe modernnation-stateor,forthatmatter,ofany state. clusion which appearsto imaginepolitywithouta state.
it would
To press Stolcke's argumenta littlefurther,
appear likely that steps taken to tryto reduce NorthSouth inequalities-for instance,throughany campaign
formorefrugallivingin the North-will have the effect
ofaggravating
economic recessionin the Northand consequent protectionism and xenophobia. There will
BENTHALL
surely be a dialectical relationshipbetween political
JONATHAN
campaignson behalf of the South and revivals of neoRoyal AnthropologicalInstitute,5o FitzroySt.,
Poujadism.
London WIP 5HS, England. 2I vII 94
With regard to the nation-state,opposition to the
I am delightedthat Stolcke finds anthropologyto be "cultural fundamentalism"diagnosed by Stolcke leads
But since
growingout of its estrangementfromreality,forsurely necessarilyto a critiqueof ethno-nationalism.
the alternativewould have been seclusion in some twi- so fewactual nation-statesare monoethnicand the conlighthome. As Alex de Waal has recentlyput it, "An- sequences of breakingup multiethnicstates into small
thropologydeals with issues of immediateimportance, entities appear to be frequentlyso disastrous,many
and its practitionershave a greaterrole than theymay commentatorsconclude that largenation-statescan do
realize"(deWaal I994:28).
more good than harm,particularlyin protectingthe seStolcke suggeststhatdoctrinalracism,which posits a curityof minorities.The last seven words of Stolcke's
hierarchyofmerit,has been neutralized,but it has prob- lecture suggest that she wants all state power to be
to appearin new forms.The con- weakened,which sounds utopian.
ablygoneunderground
ceptofgeneticdistance,which appearsto put thepeople
ofAfricaon a genealogicalbranchof theirown, has not
yet surfacedin political discourse but could easily be PIETRO CLEMENTE
thusabused. The growingtendency,too,ofsome anthro- Via Napoli 7, 53 IOO Siena,Italy.30 vII 94
pologists (following through the intellectual consequences of Darwinism) to blur ratherthan sharpenthe Stolcke's essay is bold and stimulating.It coversmany
differencebetween human beings and other primates of anthropology'stroublespots and examines theirrelacould lead politicallynot onlyto more seriousconsider- tionship to currenttrends in contemporarythought.
ation of the "rights" of chimpanzees and gorillas but While I do not concur with all aspects of her thesis, I
also to an erosion of the concept of human rightsand a admire its ambition. I appreciatethe essay's civil and
return-such as the rightis always hankeringfor-to political passion and its anthropologicalapproach to
the more traditionalloyaltiesof kin,ethnicity,and reli- macroscopic analytical objects. I stronglyapprove of
racist doctrine,the Hami- both the use of unusual sources (such as the reportsof
gion. Again, an intra-African
tic hypothesis,was disseminatedthroughthe republish- the European Communityand the political-judicialdeing of old anthropologicaltextsin Britainwell into the bates on nationalityand citizenship)and thereconstrucand, accordingto de Waal, bears some indirect tion of Frenchand Britishtendenciesin the past decade
I970S
nationalidentityand its relationshipto immiforthegenocidein Rwanda. Constantpro- regarding
responsibility
fessionalvigilance is needed.
gration.
The theses of Taguieffand the Frenchdebate on "difTo go back in history,the consequences of nazi racescience are known to all, but is it widely remembered ferentialracism" are well known in Italy. While many
thatanthropologicalknowledgeis enshrinedin the Mu- shareTaguieff'sviewpoint,I findit more appropriateto
nich Agreementof I938 on the Sudetenlandissue? The focus on the workingsof "excess identity,"Stolcke's
agreementstipulatedthat whereas the "predominantly "cultural fundamentalism."I do not, however, agree
ofCzechoslovakia was to be occupied about its alarmingpolitical implications.To beginwith,
German"territory
with the depictionof so generalimmediatelyby German troops,a commissionof repre- I have some difficulty
sentativesofthe fourBig Powerswould arrangeforpleb- ized a left and a right.In addition,it seems unfairto
iscites in the regions"where the ethnographicalcharac- attributerefinedtraditionsof thoughtsuch as those of
ter was in doubt"-a pledge that was never in fact Franz Boas and Hans-Georg Gadamer to a rightwing
whose statementsare generallyroughand prosaic. My
carriedout (ShirerIg64:s Ion).
Comments
I4
CURRENT
ANTHROPOLOGY
Volume 36, Number i, February1995
own researchhas contributedto the rediscoveryoftheir
local and historical identityof people who had abandoned rituals and customs in the confrontationwith
advancing modernization.I myselfhave assessed the
cultural patrimony of craftsmenand country folk,
defendingtheirtutelagein the name of the concept of
"culturalheritage."The currentdebateraisestheethical
question whetherthroughmy work I have fosteredcultural fundamentalismin myselfand in others,on the
one hand resistinganomie and the loss of identityand
historicalmemoryto the urbanized world but on the
other hand contributingto the creation of barriersto
new culturalencounters.I believe I can say that everyone needs cultural "roots" of dialect, symbolic form,
identity,and that these are not what produces xenophobia.
Italy is a nation crisscrossedthroughoutby interIts strengthis more pronal territorialdifferentiation.
nounced on the local than on the national level. The
theme of a "cultural homeland" was dear to our most
notedpostwarscholar,ErnestoDe Martino,who linked
it withthe necessary"criticalethnocentrism"ofthe anthropologist(De MartinoI977). The dean ofour African
studies,BernardoBernardi(I994), reproposesthe notion
of "ethnocentrism,"which,followingboth W. G. Sumner and De Martino,he considersthe basis forunderstandingof the collective workingsof encounter,exchange, and cultural mixing. Stolcke would probably
object to the use of Italy as a case in point. Here the
nationalisticplatformof the rightis not very sophisticated: it has relaunched liberal modernism, its
Reaganismneeds no culturalistfinesse,and the rightist
leagues which seek to create
tendenciesofthe territorial
a Republic of NorthernItaly bypass cultural issues in
favorof financial ones. Criticism of the new cultural
fundamentalismcould applyto regionalor ethnicmovements (Occitanists, Sardists,Altoatestins,and others)
and the new localisms which sometimes tend to build
mythsof originand unmixed purity,but these are not
on the agendain thepoliticaldebatethatStolckeis dealing with.
Stolcke's critique is also veryuseful forcertainspecificfieldsof anthropologicalwork,forexample,immigrationresearchin urbanareas. In this case it is helpful
to begin with the understandingthat the immigrantis
an individualwho oscillates betweentwo worldsand is
stimulatedto change. Contact with the values, rules,
and heritageofthis ancientand oppressiveworldofours
societiesa liberais formanypeople ofunderpriviledged
tion and an opportunityto develop new configurations.
I have always liked FrantzFanon's expression"envision
the universethroughthe particular."This "particular,"
in my opinion,is a matterofmemoryand traditionand
not necessarilyone ofnation. Stolckeis essentiallyconcerned with national identity,and perhaps I approach
thesubjectfroma different
position.It maynevertheless
be interestingto conclude with a model of an identity
that oscillates between foreignerand "culturalpatriot"
may in(as De Martinowould put it). Being a foreigner
volve cosmopolitanism,moving in and out of cultures
exchangingand gainingenoughexperienceto be able to
use the proverb"The whole world is a town." Foreigners' main limitationis lack of culturalidentity;simply
put, they do not exist culturally,as in the model of
Christian sainthood: they are foreignersin this world
because theyare partof anotherone. Having a "cultural
homeland" as a place of memories, affection,roots,
allows fora less abstractrenderingof the notion of humankind and of the individual in society,but thereis
no tradition,heritage,or memorythat does not admit
of intermixing.By oscillatingbetween these two poles
and learningby trialand error,one sees wherethe world
is going.In a vision of Utopia the "culturalhomeland"
and the universalists'"world of men" mightcoincide,
as in thebeautifulanarchistsong: "Our homelandis the
entireworld,our law is liberty."But these are not times
fordreams.
PETER
FITZPATRICK
Darwin College, Universityof Kent at Canterbury,
Canterbury,Kent CT2 7NY, England. 3 VIII 94
Some supplements,not all of them dangerous,to Stolcke's rich and revelatoryaccount: For a start,the culturalfundamentalismofEuropeanrhetoricsofexclusion
is inherentlyuntenable.It entails,as Stolcke indicates,
an essential relationbetween being and cultureand an
absolute incommensurabilitybetween cultures.To be
valid in theirown terms,thesenostrumsofculturalfundamentalismcan onlybe ofa culture.They cannotbe, as
theyassert,of all cultures.Being bounded by a distinct
culture,we cannot know thatwe know or do not know
othercultures-and, what is particularlydelicious, we
cannot know thatpeople of otherculturesdo not know
us.
Then there may be possibilities of virtuein incommensurability.Not all notions of incommensurability
are foundedon the mutual hostilityand oppressionthat
typifyculturalfundamentalism.The EuropeanEnlightenment and its Romantic aftermathwhich Stolcke
evokes did have representatives,
Diderot and Herder,for
as a benign
example,who advancedincommensurability
counter to colonialism and slavery. And is there not
honorhere in anthropologyalso?
Stolcke sees culturalfundamentalismas distinctand
perhaps even taking over fromracism. In this, nation
becomes the locus of culture.It seems difficult
to me to
make this claim withoutsayingmore about the history
of racism-about its persistence and protean forms.
There are many indications in the paper that cultural
fundamentalismin its exclusion and oppressionof the
strangermay be a formof racism,and thereare intimations that racism exceeds Stolcke's subordinationof it
to a supportfornationalism.
As Stolcke recognises,not all strangersare equally
strange.Indeed,the proponentsofculturalfundamentalism have little or no trouble acceptingthe representatives of some cultures.Yet in Stolcke's argument,the
xenophobiathatfoundsculturalfundamentalismis, unlike racism,uniformand comprehensivein its opposition to all othercultures.In this scheme culturesrelate
STOLCKE
to each otherin ways thatarenon-hierarchical
or simply
spatial.In the firstslice ofculturalfundamentalismthat
Stolckeprovides,however,Thatcher'sevocationto such
political effectof the threatof "swamping" by "people
witha different
culture,"what seems crucialis the exactitude,the territorial
precision,with which such people
are designatedin Thatcher'sspeech just beforethe part
used by Stolcke: these potential swampersare "people
ofthe New Commonwealth"[thatis, "black" people]or
"Pakistan"-which countryhad to be specificallyadded
because it had leftthe Commonwealth.Such people so
carefullyspecifiedare thencounterposedto "the British
character"which "has done so much fordemocracy,for
law, and done so much throughoutthe world." Divisions of this kind, as Stolcke aptly notes, providethe
"cultural" unityand uniformity
of the nation,a nation
which in realitycontains a diversityof cultures.They
"reterritorializecultures." Such divisions are racist
ratherthan non-hierarchicalor simply spatial. It may
Talking Culture|I i5
as theforcescreatingand promotinga multilingualenvironmentproduceda reactionfromthose who resented
and contestedthe transformation.
Stolcke compellinglyargues that the contemporary
politicalmovementon the rightthatrationalizesimmigrationrestrictionson thebasis ofculturalfundamentalism is racism in a new and different
garb. It remains
racismbecause its targetsare the same, thosecommonly
glossed as "people of color." It is different
fromracism,
however,in that its justificationis not biological but
cultural. She concludes by beseeching anthropologists
not to committhe same logical and politicalerroras the
culturalfundamentalists-notto submitto a fundamental cultural relativism that reifies cultural difference
ratherthan seeking even if incompletelyto understand
and overcomeit. We anthropologists
shouldreclaimcultural studies fromnonanthropologistsand incorporate
the insightsof postmodernawareness of culturalcomplexities and politics to address issues of domination,
helpto note,withBhabha(I994:99-IOO), that"etymo- conflict,and culture.
logically . . . 'territory'derives fromboth terra(earth)
Contests over power and meaning expose the fragile
and terrree(to frighten)whence territorium,'a place and superficialnature of cultural consensus and haroff."' Only some are mony.Cities undergoingrapid,integralreformations
fromwhich people are frightened
ofostracized,degraded,murdered,or, in short,terrorized. ferinsights.Miami is one such city.In the early I98os,
The claims of nation also extend beyond the non- those with powerand influence,the local elite,were all
hierarchicaland the simplyspatial,beyondbeingmerely white Americans.They lived in a citythathad quickly
the locus of one culture among many. Nationalism in become heavilyLatinofollowingCastro's Cuban revoluthe igth centuryservedto markoffa collectivityof cer- tion and the subsequent U.S.-sponsoredmigrationof
tain nations as exemplaryof the universal and as the nearlyio% of Cuba's population.Most immigrantssetimpetusof all thatwas becominguniversal.That eleva- tled in Miami and with the help of generousU.S. benetion was and still is effectedin racist terms.The ex- fits and the experience and capital they broughtwith
cluded are now also invitedas nations to come within them quickly established a successful immigrantentherealmoftheuniversaland the exemplary.To accom- clave. Most whiteAmericanswelcomed theseprimarily
modate the ambivalent identitythat results fromthe white,middle-class,well-educated,state-sponsoredimcall to be the same and the exclusion as different,
na- migrantseven as they bemoaned the new immigrants'
tions and culturesare stretchedbetweenvariouspolari- continuationof theirculturaldifferences,
theirpropenties-the developedand theunderdeveloped,thenormal sity to speak Spanish in public, and their right-wing,
and the backward,the usual list. The excluded serveto sometimes violent politics. Yet, they expected that
organiseand classifytheworldalong a spectrumranging these immigrantswould be like other,earlierwhite imfromthe most "advanced" liberaldemocraciesto barely migrants in assimilating to American culture, soon
coherentnations always about to slip into the abyss of speakingonly Englishin public,ignoringthe politics of
theirhomelandin favorofthose oftheirnew locale, and
ultimatealterity.
buyingwhite-Americanproductsand services.
Throughthe I98os, Cubans rapidlyascended to posiALEX STEPICK
tionsofpowerand influence.They became the majority
on the city council. They enteredthe state legislature.
Immigrationand EthnicityInstitute,Florida
InternationalUniversity,Miami, Fla. 33 I99, U.S.A.
They became top developers and builders. Soon the
whiteAmericansadmittedthemto the most influential
28 VII 94
clubs and committees.Yet, thenew immigrantshad not
are assimilated as quickly or as thoroughlyas the white
While thosewho studyimmigrationin anthropology
increasinglycalling for a transnationalapproach (e.g., Americanelite had envisioned.Many stillspoke Spanish
Glick-Schillerand Basch i992, Glick-Schiller,Basch, in public,and these were not the parkinglot attendants
and Szanton Blanc I994), the political rightinsists on but thosewhose carswerebeingparked,not thebusboys
the opposite-the need for and alleged naturalnessof and waitressesbut those orderingthe food,not the uncultural,alongwithpolitical,boundaries.The contradic- skilled workersbut those who owned the companies.
The Miami Herald played a key role in reflectingand
tion is not merely coincidental. Miami spawned the
of dominantwhite
contemporarybilingual-educationmovement in the shaping a profoundtransformation
mid-ig60s,and in I980 it spearheadedthe English-only American attitudes. Cultural concerns dominated its
backlash that subsequentlyswept throughall the states discourse, but the rapid loss of subscriberswho no
with significantSpanish-speakingminorities (Castro longerwanted an English-onlynewspaperalso heavily
1992). A more distinctdialectic could not be imagined influencedthe Herald's position. During the mid- and
6
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ANTHROPOLOGY
Volume 36, Number i, February1995
late i980s, the discourse of the Herald and prominent
whiteAmericanleaderschanged.Ratherthansuggesting
that Cubans would soon assimilate, white American
leaders applauded the multiculturalmix thatpermitted
Miami to become the capital of the Caribbeanand even
all of Latin America. Spanish-speakers,in this new vision, were central to Miami's prosperityin that they
providedsmooth business links to the region'sprimary
tradingpartners(Portesand Stepick I993). Not all culturaldiversitywas so championed.Black Haitian immigrantsnever receivedthe welcome accordedwhite Cubans. Instead, the U.S. governmentrepeatedly and
relentlesslysought to deter Haitians' arrival and persuade those in Miami to returnhome (Stepick i992).
Race and power,so inextricablymeldedin the United
States and apparentlyin Europe, determinewhere the
boundariesare drawn-who is welcomed as a member
of the culturaland political communityand who is excluded. Culture plays an independent,critical role in
both discourse and action. Cubans were conceived as
differentand treated differently
because they spoke
Spanish and much of theirpolitical attentionwas directed to their homeland. Yet, those differenceswere
toleratedat firstbecause the U.S. federalgovernment
providedresourcesto amelioratethe costs of addressing
them and later because those whose economic base remained in South Florida had no choice but to accept
them.Those who could not do so eitherfledor resisted
by foundingthe English Only movement.Black immigrants,in contrast,could never obtain sufficientpower
to effecttheirincorporationinto the local community.
Much like the native AfricanAmericans,they remain
marginal,appealing to the American ideologyof equal
treatmentregardlessof race and succeeding enough to
permitthe formationof a Haitian communitybut not
enough to provideit with the firm,powerfulbase that
Cubans enjoy.
Thus, culture and power determinethe evolution of
community-who is included or excluded.The shallow
historyof South Florida and of all the United States
comparedwith Europe precludes a deeply organicconception of the nation-state.Cultural markersmust be
used, and theycan easily be extendedor withdrawnand
are always contestedin responseto the emergingpower
ofnew groups.Yet, race remainsforemost.Whileracism
may be discreditedpoliticallyand no longeradmissible
in public discourse,it continuesto guide the policies of
people.
MARILYN
STRATHERN
Departmentof Social Anthropology,Universityof
Cambridge,Cambridge CB2 3RF, England. 3 vIII 94
This is an importantpaper.By hercarefulhistoricalexeforthe anthropologesis,Stolcke makes it verydifficult
gist to dismiss what she so aptlycalls "culturalfundamentalism"as no more than a misguidedmanifestation
of racist thinking.On the contrary,she points out all
the ways in which culturaldiscriminationhas become
a phenomenonin itself.In one sense thisis what anthropologistshave always wanted-not the particularreifications,of course,which theyfeel theyhave outgrown
(culturesas bounded,internallycoherentwholes, etc.),
but its objectification,that is, culture as an object of
thought(theirunderstandingof what gives identityand
distinctivenessto human lives). The openness of the
concept of culture,as she points out, makes it disarmingly"friendly"to use, appealing to human universals
in apparentlynon-exclusionaryterms;afterall, we "all"
have culture.This is the benignsense in which anthropologistshave promotedit. The importanceof Stolcke's
historicalworklies in elucidatingits role as an idiom of
exclusion-the new possibilitiesit affordsforwhat can
be utteredin public.Culturehas become all too utterable.
It is interestingthat along with the emphasis on the
socially constructednatureofloyaltiessubsumedunder
appeals to culturegoes an emphasis on a primordialor
naturalstate of affairs.Far fromappearingas contradictoryoropposed,both"nature"and "culture"carryweight
in thewaythenew exclusionsareframed.It is thecongruence or conflationofthese thatgivesculturalfundamentalism such power-a demonstrationthat in turngives
powerto Stolcke'sargument.This is a brilliantexposition
and,as one would expectfromtheauthor,an anthropological projectdirectedtowardsa pressingsocial issue. Its
significanceis not to be underestimated.
The only commentto make is that if the strengthof
the paper lies in its social contextualization(Stolcke is
ascribingthese ideas not to some vague "culture" but
to specificpolicies and practices)one would not want
to be carried(reassured?)by the idea thatculturalfundamentalism is a right-wingplot. It may be veryuseful
forright-wing
political language,but such politics also
draws on usages more generallycurrent.Althoughone
should not underplaythe differences
betweenEuropean
governmentsthat she sketches,dogmas of culturaldifference(and she makes this apparent)suit a whole spectrumofpositions.Thus, as we mightexpectto findin the
and left-wing
Ig80s/I990s, theysuit both right-wing
While immigrationpolicies mayoffer
platforms.
particular evidence of right-wing
political thinking,theyhold
waterpreciselybecause oftheirsaliency.Indeed,cultural
fundamentalismis too flexiblea conceptby farforcomfort.As she says,it is new and old at the same time,as it
gathersto itselfboth social constructionisttheoriesand
ideas aboutnaturalbondsand universalhumantraitsand
facilitates ideologies of assimilation and integration
alike. Differentpolitical regimesspeak in its common
language.Anthropologistshave had theirhand in this:
Stolcke'sdemonstrationis bothedifyingand disturbing.
rERENCE
TURNER
DepartmentofAnthropology,Universityof Chicago,
Chicago,Ill. 60637, U.S.A.23 vIII 94
Stolcke's article makes importantpoints about the natureofthe culturalnationalismcurrently
beingchampi:ned by the European right.I thinkshe is rightto em-
ST O L C KE
phasize the differencesbetween the new "cultural
fundamentalism"and racism while recognizingthat
both reflect,in different
ways, the contradictionin earlier formsof liberal nationalismbetween universalistic
values and the need to limit the nation to its territorial
boundaries.I also agree with her that it is essential for
anthropologyto take account of the ways in which the
new political movementsand conditionsto which she
refersare changingthe meaningof "culture" and to reflecton the implications of these changes forits own
theoreticalconceptof culture.In this connection,she is
correct,in myview, to stressthatrecentanthropological
formulationsin the postmodernist"culture-critique"
vein only recastin different
termsand do not transcend
the reificationof culturaldifference
typicalof older anthropologicalapproaches to cultures as bounded isolates.
While Stolcke's discussion contains importantinsightsinto the new culturalnationalism,she does not
claim to presentan exhaustiveaccount ofthe phenomenon or an analysisofits political and social causes. Taking her stimulatingtreatmentas a point of departure,I
would suggestthata fulleranalysiswould addressissues
such as the following:
First,culturalnationalism is not merelyor even primarilyexclusionaryand xenophobic,and theforeignimmigrantsand Gastarbeitertowardswhom it is ostensibly directedare not its primarytargets.It is a claim
forinclusion and integrationon more favorablesocial,
political, and economic terms directed at dominant
political and technobureaucraticgroups by relatively
disenfranchised,dominated elements of the national
population. This is why the new cultural nationalist
movementscannot simplybe understoodas expressions
ofthe political right,even thoughit is the rightthathas
effectively
co-optedthem.What must also be accounted
foris theirpopulist characteras the social and political
protestsof subordinatesocial strata against the dominantpolitical-economicand culturalorderthatexcludes
themfromfullparticipationin the national life.In this
wider perspectivethe implicit ultimate end of these
movementsis not the "culturalcleansing"ofthe nation
but theirown fuller
throughthe expulsion offoreigners
integrationinto and more equitable participationin the
social and economic life of the nation. Opposition to
foreignersand immigrantsis an apt means to this end
because foreignmigrantsand guest-workers
arethemost
visible,accessible,and vulnerableextensionofthehegemonic political and technoeconomic system that the
protestersfeel oppressesand excludes them. Calling for
the exclusionofforeignelementson nationalistgrounds
is a convenientway of stressingthe common ground
the protestersshare with the dominantelementsof the
nationalsociety-the bureaucracyand thepoliticalleadership-and thus gainingmoral leverage over them to
compel themto take more account ofthe protestersand
theirdemands.
Any attemptto understandthe new formsof cultural
and ethnic nationalism must account forthe fact that
while xenophobicculturalfundamentalismis becoming
Talking Culture I I 7
a right-wing
populistidiom ofprotestbylower-classand
marginalelementsofEuropeannational societies,an often equally fundamentalistmulticulturalismis becoming the preferredidiom in which minorityethnic and
racialgroupsare assertingtheirrightto a full and equal
rolein the same societies.These groupsand movements
overtlyassert their cultural, ethnic, and/or national
"identities"as the legitimizingbasis of claims to inclusion on an equal footingin multiethnicnational societies (or,in extremecases, claims to separateexistenceas
independentnations) ratherthan as calls forthe exclusion of culturallydifferent
groups.Rightistexclusionist
cultural nationalism and left-orientedinclusionist
I suggest,should be understoodas
mnulticulturalism,
complementaryrefractionsof the same conjunctureof
social and political-economicforces.
There are two fundamentalreasonsthatculturalidentityhas emergedas the idiom of choice forexpessions
ofsocial discontentby marginalizedor downwardlymobile elements of national populations.The firstis that
it is virtuallythe only aspect of their relation to the
national society that they still own and control-the
onlyone, by the same token,beyondthe controlof national political and cultural elites. The second is the
politicalpotencyof the conceptionof national identity
intrinsicto modernEuropean nationalismfromits origins in the i8th and igth centuries.As Stolcke points
out,boththe liberalrepublican(French)and reactionary
culturalist(German) formsof nationalism rested on a
conceptionof national identityas the expressionof a
distinctive historical and cultural heritage shared
zquallyby all individualmembersof the national community.The result has been to legitimize a cultural
3ense of national identitynot only as an inalienable
of everyindividual,and hence beyondthe conproperty
trolof elites, but also as the justificationforpolitical
Alaimsmade in the name of the nation and the uniformityof its legal normsor social mores.
What is now happeningis that subordinateand mar3-inalelements of the national societies of Europe are
not for the first time) picking up this ideological
weaponand usingit againstthehegemonicliberalestabLishmentsand state governmentsthat have presided
wverthe erosion of theireconomic and social condition
n therecentperiodofthe consolidationoftransnational
:apitalism.The responsesofnational establishmentsto
-heprotestsof the "cultural fundamentalists"have of-enironicallyreflectedthe assertionsof the protesters,
is when multiculturalistclaims are resistedby cultural
iuthoritiesin the name of the need forculturalunifornity as the basis of national political integration.
In the past, similarmovementsofnationalist"fundanentalism," such as fascism,have seized upon race or
)therissues as the specificvehicles oftheircauses. Stol,ke is correctto stress the relative uniqueness of the
,urrentwave of "culturalist" movements in this re;pect. The question is why "culture" in the contempoary sense of a common "identity"or universeof dis,ourse and social standardsratherthan "race" or even
in the older German sense of a historic
SYemeinschaft
8
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ANTHROPOLOGY
Volume 36, Number i, FebruaryI995
folk communityhas now become the focus of the new
movements.The answeris to be foundin the dominant
socioeconomic conditions of the historical period in
which the new movementshave emerged.
As the governmentsof nation-statesare increasingly
redefinedas local committeesof an ever more powerfullyorganizedtransnationalcapitalistsystemof financial institutions,labor movements,circulatingcapital,
and commodityflows,theirpolitical and economic institutionsbecome increasinglyinaccessibleto influence
by the mass of their populations. As the traditional
meaning of political citizenship withers away under
these circumstances,the abilityof national regimesto
guaranteetheircitizens access to commodityconsumption on a scale commensuratewith theirsocial aspirations has become theirprimarybasis of political legitimation. Consumption of commodities has thus
supplantedthe exerciseof the traditionalpolitical functions of citizenshipas the main mode of the construction-and thus control-of personalidentity.The individualisticformof this identityconstruction,however,
is limited and orientedby the social values of the national society;it thus constitutesa culturalformofparticipationin the national identity,the formthat now
provides the most immediate and satisfyingsense of
power over the termsof personal and social existence.
Cultural identityand national cultural identityas its
most fundamental,socially shared aspect thus become
the most politicallyfraughtidiom of solidarityand protest alike in contemporarycapitalistsocieties.
What are the implicationsof these developmentsfor
the anthropologicalconcept of culture?Firstand most
obvious,"culture" cannotbe theorizedin isolationfrom
the social conditionsin which it arises and vice versa.
Secondly,the attemptto do so, characteristicof most
anthropologicaltheorizingabout culture fromthe Boasians to the contemporary
proponentsof anthropology
as ethnographicwriting,should be recognizedas a continuationof the fundamentalideological mystification
centralto the originsof the cultureconceptin German
Romanticnationalism."Culture" as nationalisticideology servedto sever consciousness of the unequal social
roots of the new orderof bourgeoispolitical-economic
dominationbyprojectingit as an expressionofuniversal
ideal principlesof liberty,equality,and fraternity
or,alternatively,of volkische Gemeinschaft,even as it explicitlyopposed the idealized concept of the new order
to the obsolete social orderof monarchicalfeudalism.
The abstractionof ideal principlesas culturalrepresentations of uniformlyshared social qualities frommaterial social relationsand conditionsand an almost Manichaean opposition of the formerto the latter thus
became a foundationalprincipleof modernsocial consciousness, including nationalism and anthropological
conceptsof cultureamong its variantforms.The frighteningresurgenceof right-wing
movements,both in Europe and in America,based on formsof culturalfundamentalism that mystifythe real social causes of the
discontenton which theyfeedshouldpromptanthropologiststo recognizethe urgencyof the need to develop a
genuinelycritical perspectiveon "culture" capable of
revealingthe continuityand interdependenceof forms
ofsocial consciousnessand the materialsocial relations
thatgive rise to them.
WALTER
P. ZENNER
DepartmentofAnthropology,State Universityof New
Yorkat Albany,Albany,N.Y. I2222, U.S.A. I I VII 94
In her interestinganalysis of the new "rhetoricsof exclusion" in WesternEurope,Stolckelimitsherselfto the
responseof respectableconservativepolitical leaders to
the new "extracommunitarianimmigration" rather
than dealing with "popular reactionsand sentiments."
She also links these ideological changes to the ways in
which Britain and France in particularhave absorbed
immigrantsin the past four decades and to the view
of the "nation" in the two countries.The authoritative
ratherthanto race recalls
appeal to "culturaldifference"
a similar response by post-World War II imperialists.
The late Melville J.Herskovitsin his lecturesreferred
to this as "culturalism,"but Stolcke's "culturalfundamentalism"is a more stylishrubric.
While the notion of "new rhetoricsof exclusion" can
to some extentbe appliedto theUnited States,thismust
be done carefully.Stolcke's political referenceto the
rightand to conservativeliberals is limited to a European context.The so-calledrightin the United Statesis
splitalong severallines, includingthe "Christianright"
and ex-liberal "neoconservatives." The latter include
"environmentaloptimists" like JulianSimon and Ben
Wattenbergwho tendto favoropen immigration.Those
on the leftmay employa "rhetoricofexclusion" oftheir
own. Slogans of class conflictare an example of this,
and Anglophobiaand anti-Americanismare xenophobic
views which have been used by both the left and the
right.
WhileI tendto agreewith Stolckethatwe shouldtake
the "nonracist"rhetoricof these "culturists"seriously,
we must do so with care. Unlike anthropologists,
politicians and ideologues have no all-embracingtheoryof
culture.How do people acquire the "national consciousness" that theyenvision?Is it by earlysocialization,as
theBoasians believe,or is acquisitionpracticallybiological? The formermightbe accomplishedthroughlimited
immigrationand assimilationisteducation,but the latter would simply be racist. We should rememberthat
manytheoristshave not internalizedFranzBoas's generalization that there is no one-to-onerelationshipbetweenrace, language,and culture.Racists like Sombart
gaveculturalas well as biologicalexplanationsfordifferences between ethnicgroupsand nations. It is not hard
to imaginethatmodernculturistsdo not excludebiological explanationsbut simply do not bringthem to the
fore.
Of greaterweightare two omissions by Stolcke. Her
decision not to discuss popular anti-immigration
sentimentis unfortunate,
since one can assume thatpolitical
leadersfindimmigrationa veryfruitful
issue to exploit.
STOLCKE
Talking Culture I
The interactionbetween the political class and other forma paradoxicalpart of modernityratherthan being
classes on immigrationfeeds the resentmentof immi- an anachronismin modernsocietyor a residue of their
grants.It is also a test ofa theoreticalexplanationofthe slave past-a point I have stressedsince my early research on Igth-centuryCuba (II974). As Goldberg
importanceof certainframesof economic problems.
Stolcke tends to dismiss the social scientificstudyof (I993:4) has persuasivelyput it, "This is a centralparaethnocentrism(xenophobia)by viewing it primarilyas dox, the ironyperhaps,of modernity:The more explica componentof a conservativeideology. She does not itlyuniversalmodernity'scommitments,the moreopen
differentiate
between the two. The factthathuman be- it is to and the more determinedit is by the likes of
ings may love and hate "other peoples" differentially racial specificityand racial exclusivity." Less clear,
and serially seems to prove that ethnocentrismis not however,is the specificcharacterofthese new attitudes
a human universal.In this regard,her dismissal of the and rhetoricof exclusion and theirroots,partlyperhaps
Bosnian case is particularlyshallow. She refersto the because ofa certaindifficulty
in overcomingestablished
fact that up to the present wars the various ethnic notionsofmodernsociety,culture,identity,and racism
groupsof thatunfortunateland had good neighborlyre- itself.
In view ofthe noveltyand complexityofthe phenomlations, without considerationof the long and complicated historyof the Yugoslav lands. She also does not enon,I have advisedlychosen to focuson onlyone manireferto sophisticatedsocial scientificstudies of xeno- festation,namely, right-wingrhetorics of exclusion
phobia such as that conductedby Donald T. Campbell, whose targetsare extracommunitarian
immigrants.The
RobertA. LeVine,and theirassociates,in whichhypoth- comments on my paper are not only most helpfulin
eses derivedfromthe Spencer-Sumnerformulationof a clarifying
my definitionsbut also raise a numberofperuniversal syndromeof ethnocentrismwere developed tinentquestions that,by goingbeyondthe limitedaims
and tested cross-culturally.While the study was too of my analysis,are usefulforexpandinganthropology's
broadto summarizehere and too incompleteto support researchagenda regardingthe political and theoretical
finalconclusions,it is worthnotingthatethnocentrism challenges posed by the new global disorderand espein thisview beginswithhighself-regard,
which in fairly cially its ideological "overpinnings."
I fully agree with Fitzpatrick'ssubstantiveobservaintricateways is tied to fearand hatredof some outsiders (LeVine and Campbell I972, Brewerand Campbell tion that cultural fundamentalists'postulated incommensurabilityof culturesis, in the end, nonsensicalI976).
I agreewith Stolcke thatwe should tryto understand thoughperhapsno less so than some ofthe postmodern
thefluidityand flexibilityofhumanways oflifeand that radical-relativist
ethnographicendeavours.Yet, ideologthe political meaningsof culturaldifferences
should be ical postulatesdo not have to have cognitivecoherence
a majorfocus of our work.It is easy to forget,however, to be politically effective.The integrationiststrandin
thatmanyofour professionalforebearsunderstoodthis. Cuban and Brazilianpolitical racismwhich sustaineda
Forinstance,Herskovits,who was known as a principal hierarchyofraces but advocatedmiscegenationto overproponentof culturalrelativism,also showed how peo- come potential sociopolitical conflicts between the
ples of differentbackground borrow and transform "races'' could also be considereduntenable in a strict
elements of each other's culture (Herskovits I964: sense. In addition,it is no noveltythat a notion,in this
i59-2i2). Edward Spicer (i980:287-362), as a result case incommensurability
between cultures,may be put
of his lifelong work on the Yaqui and the western to different
uses and have different
meaningsand conseU.S.-Mexican borderlands,showed how some ethnic quences depending on socio-historicalcontexts. Culboundariesare preservedin spite ofgreatchangesin cul- tural relativism,when it was firstdefendedby Boas
ture.The persistenceof ethnicidentity,in fact,is often againstracistand otherethnocentricdeterminisms,
was
inverselycorrelatedwith changes in culture. I thank progressivein the colonial context.In the contemporary
Stolckeforchallengingus to reconsiderthese questions. crisis-ridden
postcolonialworld,radical culturalrelativism spells exclusion. As Taguieffhas shown,moreover,
the new rightin France adoptedthe idea of incommensurabilityinstead of orderingcultureshierarchicallyto
avoid the negativeinegalitarianconnotationof the latter. In practice,culturalfundamentalismof course oppressesimmigrantseconomicallyand socially,is applied
and producesand reproduces
VERENA
onlyto subalternstrangers,
STOLCKE
inequality.Yet, as I argue,socioeconomic exclusion and
Barcelona, Spain. 26 IX94
inequalityare now a consequence of immigrationconThe resurgenceof "racism" in contemporary
Europehas trols defendedand implementedby conservativesand
generateda wealth ofresearchthathas enrichedbut also the rightratherthan being thematizedin theirrhetoric
challengedtraditionalnotions ofracism.The categories of exclusion. In theory,and again forthe sake of arguapplied to its classical period have proved insufficient mentativecoherence,the targetis any extracommunito account forthese new essentialistdoctrinesof exclu- tarianimmigrant,but in practiceit is the Third World
sion. Central to this revisionof earliertheorizationsof poor whose exclusion is legitimatedbecause it is they
"racism" is the gradual awareness that such doctrines ratherthan,forexample, an Arab oil magnatewho are
Reply
.201
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ANTHROPOLOGY
Volume 36, Number i, FebruaryI995
seen as threateningsocial orderin the contextof eco- duce new contradictionsand tensions. Liberal capitalnomic recession. Stepick's observations on the con- ism is inherentlyincapable of makingeveryonehappy.
trastingexperienceofCuban and Haitian immigrantsin
Turner and Zenner regretthat I have not discussed
Florida,thoughreferring
to the specificcontextof the popular attitudesvis-a-visimmigrants.Turner's obserUnited States,providea suggestiveexample ofthe com- vations qualifyingand extendingmy analysis are espeplex intersectionbetween economic power and essen- cially valuable. Of course, any theoryof exclusion has
tialistdifferentiation.
its obverse,althoughit is oftennot recognizedthatidenThatcher's famous statement is admittedly less tity,be it ethnic,cultural,national,political,and/orof
clearlyculturalistthan I have wanted to make out, but gender,is a relationshipand logically always implies a
the fact that the "people of the New Commonwealth" contrastingother.Nationalityrules,forexample,at first
and of Pakistan,who are its targets,are phenotypically sight are about the prerequisitesforacquiringcitizennonwhiteis not sufficientreason to extrapolateracism ship,thatis, inclusion,in a statebut implicitlyofcourse
fromit. Instead of supposingthat classical racism is at also definewho are noncitizens.Explicit emphases on
work every time those who are discriminatedagainst exclusion or inclusion depend,however,on the "probare phenotypicallydifferent,
we now need seriouslyto lem" posed. Recent researchon citizenshipin relation
ask ourselveswhat is in a face nowadays.What does it to human rights,for example, in Latin America, has
mean, forexample,thatforeigners
ofNorthAfricanori- tendedto be inward-looking,
neglectingthe conceptualgin are systematicallystopped by the French police ization ofnationalityas its precondition.The alarmover
searchingforillegal immigrantsbecause theyhave "the extracommunitarian
immigrationin contemporaryEuwrongface" (Dubet I989, citedby SilvermanI992: I36)? rope,by contrast,has enhancedthe visibilityof the forThere is, indeed,a growingawarenessamongscholars eign "other" and the debate over politics of exclusion
that contemporary
Europeanpolitics and policies of ex- while, nonetheless, revitalizingcommonsense underclusion are informedby claims of nation. Nineteenth- standingsof national belonging,identity,and citizencenturynationalismand late-2oth-century
culturalfun- ship rights.The postwar welfare state in Europe cerdamentalism,as I have analyzedit, sharethe conflation tainly reinforcedthe populations' ideas of national
of people-nation-territory.
By contrast with igth- entitlementwhich are now being eroded by economic
century typically hierarchical racist nationalism, recession. The ensuing frustrationsare oftenbut not
however, contemporarycultural fundamentalism,by necessarilyalways and by everyonedirectedagainstexemphasizing cultural-national incommensurability, tracommunitarianimmigrants.Particularnational histhe planet into separateuniversesratherthan tories complicate the picture.In the case of Spain, for
fragments
explicitly invoking underdevelopmenton account of example, the experience of emigrationto France and
backwardnessto deny that "we" have anythingto do Germanyin the sixties of almost 3 million labouring
with the ever-growinginequality between "us" and men and women often serves as an antidote to anti"them" so as not to be takenforracists.Perhapsit needs immigrantsentiments.One immigrantfromAndalucia
stressing once more that to challenge racist reduc- recentlyinsisted to me, however,that he was not an
tionisms in contemporaryanalyses of anti-immigrant immigrantbut a forastero(roughly,"stranger,"though
rhetoricis in no way to minimize the horrorsthat this the termpreciselylacks the national connotation),obviimplies for"them." The extentto which racist catego- ously seeking to distance himself from the stigma
ries continueto shape people's attitudeseven iftheyare attached to extracommunitarian
immigrants,although
not publiclyadmitted(Stepick)is a matterforresearch until veryrecentlyAndalucian immigrantswere called
which above all must pay carefulattentionto argumen- and called themselvessimply"immigrants."
Much more complicated is, however, the way in
tativestructuresin particularcontextsand political trawhich rhetoricsof political elites interactwith underditions.
Benthallrightlypoints to the absence in my paper of standingsof the dominatedmajorityof the population.
an explanationof the North-SouthinequalitythatI cite The political success of the anti-immigrant
platforms
as the "root cause" of cultural fundamentalism.But of the political right-to the extentthat not only conthen,I suggesta more complicatedset ofdialecticinter- servativebut also social-democraticgovernmentshave
actionsbetweenideologicalconstructsand materialrea- adoptedan exclusionaryrhetoricand policies-and the
sons ratherthan a single "cause"-a dialectic between hostilityand recurrentaggressionagainstimmigrantson
sociopoliticaltensionsgeneratedby the economicreces- the part of "ordinarypeople" provide ample evidence
sion in advancedcapitalistEuropeand ideologicalscape- that neitherare the politicians preachingin the desert
goatingof extracommunitarian
immigrantswhich is in- nor is cultural fundamentalismmerely a perversefigformedby new and old ideas of national entitlement, mentofthe imaginationofsmall extremistgroupsas, in
inclusion,and exclusion in the guise, forreasons of po- fact,earlyreportson the resurgenceofracismin Europe
litical expediency,of a radicallyrelativistculturalistid- maintained.It is also well known that the production
iom. These timesofeconomic crisisare evidentlyaverse ofan externalenemyand threatgeneratesinternalsocioto progressiveprogramsof change,but it seems equally economic cohesion. The powerofpatriotism,especially
evident that any piecemeal reformwithin prevailing duringWorld War I, in bridgingclass divisions is only
structuresof power and inequalitywill inevitablypro- one example. Contemporaryculturetalk has, as Strath-
STOLCKE
ernrecentlyobserved,contributedto obscuringsociety.
To understandthe politics of culturalfundamentalism
we requiremuch moredetailedresearchon popularselfunderstandings
regardingpolitical-nationaland cultural
identityand identifications.Central in this respect is
a properhistoricalperspectivethat pays due attention
preciselyto the "dialogue" betweenideologuesand subalternsectorsand to theeconomic contextwithinwhich
culturalfundamentalismflourishes.My hope is thatmy
paper may stimulate investigationsof this kind. The
vast literatureon the socioeconomiccircumstancesthat
gave rise to fascismmay providevaluable insightshere,
but again one should beware of easy reductionisms.
Turnerand Stratherndrawattentionto thewide political spectrumthat nowadays endorsesor is receptiveto
cultural fundamentalistideas in Europe of the kind I
discuss, and Clemente rightlyinsists on the need to
identifyin more detail the tendencieswithin the right
and the left.Multiculturalismis an importantcase in
point, as are certain strands of defensive ethnonationalismon the left.Forexample,in Catalunya,antistatistnationalistsof the extremeleftmay be heardvehementlydefendingnational cultural identityas the
onlyeffectivesourceofsocial cohesionin the contemporaryaggressivelyindividualistworld;hence, theyargue,
extracommunitarian
immigrantsmust assimilate.They
entirelydisregard,
however,thefactthatneoliberalcapitalist consumer society, by reinforcingindividualism,
fragmentssociety and the consequences of this, as
pointedout byTurner,and thefactthatculturalidentity
and oppressionare producedhistorically.
An argued critique of contemporarycultural fundamentalism,I believe, does not (as Clemente seems to
think)precludeanthropologicalresearchinto particular
cultural processes and reinventionsas long as this is
not done (again, as Turner observes)in isolation from
historicalsociopolitical conditions.Of course, cultural
identitydoes not producexenophobiabut ratherthe reverse. That "everyoneneeds cultural 'roots"' is, however,fartoo generala statementand prejudgesthe crucial issues regardingthe prerequisitesof identityand of
the productionof differencewhich anthropologistsurgentlyneed to investigate.
I have limitedmyselfto comparingFranceand Britain
because I am aware ofhow importantspecifichistorical
and contextualconditionsand relationsare in endowing
sociopoliticalprocesseswithmeaning.In thissense Italy
strikesme as especially interestingconsideringits recent political history.Stepickand Zenner offerinteresting comments from the vantage point of the United
States.I would, however,be veryhesitantto extendthe
notion of cultural fundamentalismwithout qualificationto NorthAmerica,not least because ofits historical
past in slavery and postemancipationracism. Boasian
cultural anthropologywas a momentous reaction to
this. The opposition to nazism duringWorld War II
shaped in a dramaticfashionthe refutationofracismas
a legitimateintellectualand political stance. The civil
rightsstrugglesof the sixties contributedfurtherto the
2
Talking Culture 2i
replacementof the idea of "race" in differentialdiscourse by the obviously ambivalent term "ethnicity"
andlatelyby"culture"(Barkani992, StolckeI993). The
issue is not, however,only one of words but, as I have
attemptedto show, one of the assumptionsand conceptual structuresof new culturalistrhetorics.
The idea that humans are inherentlyethnocentricis,
as I argue,the naturalisticand hence universalistideological assumption on which contemporaryEuropean
culturalfundamentalismis built. This does not mean
that,as Zenner seems to think,I dismiss the studyby
the social sciences of ethnocentrismand xenophobianota bene, as historical phenomena. Anthropologists
have traditionallyinvestigatedcommunities,peoples,or
be ill-equipped
culturesas isolates. They may therefore
to offerinsights into interrelationshipsbetween cultures,but we need urgentlyto incorporatea relational
approach,not least to interrogateearliersocial science
formulationsof a "universal syndromeof ethnocentrism"which,forreasons I have spelled out, I regardas
highlysuspect.
Finally,on thenation-stateand its prospects:Benthall
mentionsthe widespreadidea amongscholarsthatlarge
nation-statesmay be less oppressiveforminorities,but
again this depends on the context.The United States,
forexample,does not appear to me to excel in its tolerance with regardto its multiple"minorities."There are
those who argue that transnationalcapitalism,by deprivingit ofits traditionaleconomic-politicalfunctions,
spells doom forthe nation-state.The EuropeanCommunity is celebratedas one outstandingexample of this.
Yet, while capital and commoditiesnowadaysknow no
national frontiers,
the movementof people is quite anothermatter.One crucial functionof the nation-state,
namely,controllingthe movementofpeople across borof indusders,has been revitalizedby the restructuring
trial production. Industries may organize production
across borders,seeking to reduce productioncosts and
increase profits.But structuralunemployment,especially in the North, and its political consequences are
deepeningnational divisionsratherthan dissolvingborders. Not even the foundationaldocument of the new
democratic postwar world order,the United Nations
Universal Declaration of Human Rights, consecrates
people's rightto free choice of their residence. While
"everyonehas the rightof freedomof movementand
residencewithin the bordersof each state," movement
betweenstates is limitedto the rightto leave any country,includingone's own, and returnto one's country.
Nowadays, European citizens as workerscannot move
completelyfreelywithinthe EuropeanCommunity.Yet
even those rightsenjoyedby Europeansare denied altogetherto long-settledresidentswho happen to be thirdcountrynationals. Analyses oftentend to pay attention
to the flowof capital and goods to the neglectof thatof
people. Despite radically changed economic circumstances,the problemposed by the formationofthe modernnation-statein the earlyigth century,how to bound
the citizenry,remainswith us.
2|
CURRENT
ANTHROPOLOGY
Volume 36, Number i, FebruaryI995
My conclusion is admittedlyutopian, but then, as
Goya showed so powerfullyin his caprichos,"Phantasy
abandoned by reason produces impossible monsters:
united with reason it is the motherof the arts and the
originof marvels."
I99 Ib. Sovereignty:
The Britishexperience.TimesLiterarySupplement,
November29, pp. I5-I6.
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DANIEL,
AND THOMAS
SCHMID.
i99i. Wenn
derWestenunwiderstehlich
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1I992.HeimatBabylon:Das Wagnisdermultikulturellen
Demokratie.Hoffman
und Campe.
COMMISSION
OF THE EUROPEAN
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i987. A
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culturalaction.
1I992.New prospectsforcommunity
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TALAL.
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and intergroup
attributes:East AfricaneviPARLIAMENT.
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and xenophobia.Brussels.
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Franceand Germany.Cambridge:HarvardUniversity
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JamesChandler,
has beendirectedtowardthecentralconcernof what
littleattention
Surprisingly
evidencein researchand scholarship.QuestionsofEvidenceseeksto
constitutes
thirteen
majoressaysby leadingscholarsand
together
fillthatgap by bringing
in multiplefieldsacrossthesciencesandhumanities.Each essay
researchers
(originallypublishedin CriticalInquiry)is accompaniedby a never-beforepublishedcriticalresponseand a rejoinderbytheauthorof theoriginalessay.
Lorraine
JeanComaroff,
Teffy
Castle,JamesChandler,
includeLaurenBerlant,
Contributors
Elizabeth
IanHacking,
Harry
Harootunian,
Daston,ArnoldI. Davidson,CarloGinzburg,
MaryPoovey,
Meltzer,
R. C. Lewontin,
Fran9oise
ThomasC. Holt,MarkKelman,
Helsinger,
JoanW. Scott,Eve
SimonSchaffer,
Lawrence
Rothfield,
Richards,
Robert
DonaldPreziosi,
Pierre
CassR. Sunstein,
JoelSnyder,
Smith,
BarbaraHerrnstein
Sedgwick,
Kosofsky
andWilliamWimsatt.
Vidal-Naquet,
1994
512 p. (est.) ISBN: 0-226-10082-0 Cloth
ISBN: 0-226-10083-9 Paper
$42.00
$19.95
ofChicago Press, 11030S. LangleyAve.,
orfromThe University
Availableatbookstores
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