Contesting the constructs of national identity and values

While migrants experiencing difficulties in English ought not to suffer sanction and stigmatisation or be refused citizenship, there are also elements of the integrationist agenda (as opposed to the assimilationist agenda that Howard likes to call integrationist), that should not be summarily dismissed.

Specifically, the success of an open and participatory public sphere of critical inquiry and debate presumes shared bonds of communication. As a minimum condition of communication, therefore, it is fair to suppose English should be taught in all our schools. At least this is not controversial. Integration, as opposed to assimilation, does not assume a single template of national culture and identity, but rather can imply the building of common bonds of communication and respect for liberties that provide the foundation for a pluralist and multicultural society.

While pluralism and diversity ought to be celebrated, this does not imply that “anything goes”. “Difference” should not be an end in itself. The existence of pluralism, here, supposes that “anything does not go”, i.e., that the right to pluralism of identity, political conviction, faith, expression are all supported by the nurturing of liberal assumptions in law, culture and tradition.

We must still make ethical judgments between what is right and wrong - including the need for an open, participatory and pluralist public sphere - and this needs to find reflection in law.

Rather than rejecting the very idea of “Australian values”, we should all be contributing to a conversation on this most sensitive of issues in the hope that the consequence will be the protection and advancement of the liberal and social rights that we all ought to enjoy: but not take for granted.