Breakup time, US style

John Derbyshire: Will the United States Survive Until 2022?

Ref: New English Review, January 2007

A treatise on the centrifugal forces at work on the United States.

Identity and migration

Francis Fukuyama: Identity and migration

Ref: Prospect Magazine, Feb 2007

Francis Fukuyama on the difficulties of assimilating into a culture that is increasingly non coherent under the aegis of multiculturalism:

“Multiculturalism—under- stood not just as tolerance of cultural diversity but as the demand for legal recognition of the rights of racial, religious or cultural groups—has now become established in virtually all modern liberal democracies. US politics over the past generation has been consumed with controversies over affirmative action for African-Americans, bilingualism and gay marriage, driven by formerly marginalised groups that demand recognition not just of their rights as individuals but of their rights as members of groups. And the US’s Lockean tradition of individual rights has meant that these efforts to assert group rights have been tremendously controversial—more so than in modern Europe.”