Multicultural Education Past, Present, and Future: Struggles for Dialog and Power-Sharing

Using Kymlicka’s analysis of conflicts between “imperatives of state control” and “objectives of social movements,” I draw on my experiences with multicultural education to extrapolate some trends from the past and present that may inform the future. After briefly describing the origins of multicultural education (mainly within the United States), I situate struggles over education in the context of the global expansion of neoliberalism, critique “neoliberal multicultural education,” then briefly describe some efforts that push back. This essay concludes with four recommendations for moving forward.