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White Democracy and the Foreigner: A Call for Plural Cultural Democracy

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The Weariness of Democracy
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Abstract

Obed Frausto argues that US democracy conceals a dominant cultural tyranny of whiteness that he calls white democracy. Frausto argues in this chapter that white democracy is upheld by two pillars of American ideology. First, the melting pot is a concept that demands cultural assimilation, and it functions as a form of cultural terrorism against immigrants’ cultures, traditions, and languages. Second, the American Dream, the idea that any person in the United States can succeed, encourages selfish individualism and consumerism and also promotes the superiority of US culture. To counteract white democracy, Frausto proposes a conception of plural cultural democracy that promotes the recognition of cultural diversity in politics and the political participation of immigrants.

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Notes

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  33. 33.

    Walzer, What it Means to be an American, 6.

  34. 34.

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Frausto, O. (2020). White Democracy and the Foreigner: A Call for Plural Cultural Democracy. In: Frausto, O., Powell, J., Vitale, S. (eds) The Weariness of Democracy. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-19341-6_10

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