What is meant by cultural diversity? Why is India considered to be a very diverse country?
The term diversity basically means difference not inequality. Cultural diversity means existence of difference types of groups and communities practicing different cultures and norms.
India is said to be a diverse country because it has many groups and communities in it, which practices different types of culture. These communities may be distinguished on the basis of language, religion, caste, sector or race.
The toughest challenge faced by cultural diversity is the competition and conflicts between the variety of groups and communities due to difference in culture.
Sometimes cultural differences are accompanied by social and economic inequalities, which further complicate things.
What is community identity and how is it formed?
Community identity means to which community one belongs to, it is based on birth and belonging and has nothing to do with acquired qualifications and accomplishments.
It is based on what we are than what we have become.
Such identities are called “ascriptive”, which means they are acquired by birth and can’t be chosen.
Community identity provides sense of security and satisfaction to people despite of the fact that it is accidental and not chosen or planned.
People are very emotionally attached to their community identity and tend to get violent when there is any perceived threat against it.
Why is it difficult to define the nation? How are nation and state related in modern society?
a) A nation is such type of community which can be very easily described but there has not been any appropriate definition for it. There is no such defining feature for any nation.
b) We can describe nation as a community of communities.
c) Max Weber has defined the state as a body that successfully claims a monopoly of legitimate force in a particular territory.
d) If we describe the relationship between nation and state, we can say that nations are community of communities that have a state of their own. So, we denote it by the term nation-state.
e) In modern times there is one-to-one bond between nation and state.
f) Therefore, in present we can define state as a community that has succeeded in acquiring a state of its own.
g) In Modern era nation is the most accepted justification for a state and people ask the ultimate source of legitimacy of the nation.
Why are states often suspicious of cultural diversity?
a) States are often suspicious of cultural diversity because they find it as a threat to state unity.
b) States try to establish and enhance the political legitimacy by nation building strategies.
c) They try to secure the loyalty and obedience of their citizens through the policies of integration.
d) In order to accommodate the cultural differences many states have resorted to either suppress the diverse identities or ignore them on political domain.
e) They apply the policy of integration and assert a single national identity so as to eliminate the cultural differences from public and political arena.
What is regionalism? What factors is it usually based on?
Regionalism is the natural liking of people to the specific area or region they belong to.
Regionalism is based on following factors –
a) India has cultural diversity including diversity of language, religion and tribes. Therefore, regionalism is rooted in India's diversity.
b) Indian federalism has been a way of accommodating these regional sentiments.
c) During British period India was divided into large provinces called Presidencies and the three major Presidencies were Madras, Bombay and Calcutta. It continued even after independence and these were reorganized into ethno-linguistic States within Indian Union after the adoption of constitution.
In your opinion, has the linguistic reorganisation of states helped or harmed India?
Prior to freedom India was also divided on the basis of language, the freedom fighters like Mahatma Gandhi and some other leaders promised that the free India would be based on new set of provinces and one principal language.
In 1947 when India became free from British rulers it was also divided on the basis of religion and language, so the Congress leaders were hesitating to announce a principal language because they were afraid that it may result in more partitions.
But later on the states were reorganized on linguistic basis such as Punjab was reorganized in April 1966 and the hindi region of Punjab was transferred to Himachal Pradesh.
As per my opinion the linguistic organisation of state has helped India by strengthening the unity and integrity of the country.
What is a ‘minority’? Why do minorities need protection from the state?
In sociological context, the term minority is not only related to numerical distinction, but it involves such group which are disadvantaged in any manner. Therefore, minority means relatively small and disadvantaged group. The people, who any how qualify to be in minority group but are extremely wealthy, are referred as privileged minority.
The religious and cultural minority groups need special protection due to following reasons -
a) The demographic dominance of majority
b) Fear of the risk of abandon of their identity. They fear that if the political power will be in hand of majority community they will use it to suppress their religious or cultural Institution.
What is communalism?
a) Communalism means an aggressive patriotism for a religious identity. This aggressive patriotism is called chauvinism.
b) Chauvinism means an attitude that believes only his own group is the legitimate one and all other existing groups are inferior, illegitimate and opposed. Therefore, we can define communalism as an aggressive political ideology linked to religion.
c) Communalism is about politics and not about religion although the communalists are intensely involved with religion. However, there is no necessary relationship between communalism and personal faith. A communalist may or may not be a devout person, and a devout believer may or may not become a communalist.
d) Communalists cultivate an aggressive political identity and strongly criticize all those who do not share their identity.
e) All communalists believe in political identity based on religion.
f) An important feature of communalism is that it claims that religious identity overrides anything else
What are the different senses in which ‘secularism’ has been understood in India?
a) Secularism is hard to define clearly rather it is quite controversial. It is quite complex term in social and political theory.
b) The process of separation of religious and political authority is called secularisation.
c) Being secular can be defined as not being communal. So a secular person or state is one which does not favour any particular religion over others.
d) India is a secular State as it respects all the religions equally. The best example is that we have public holidays on the festivals of all religions.
e) In western sense, being secular means maintaining distance from religion where as in India being secular, means giving equal respect to all the religions.
What is the relevance of civil society organisations today?
a) Civil society is a broad concept; it lies not only beyond the private domain of the family but also outside the domain of state and market.
b) Civil society is the non-state and non-market part of public domain in which the individuals voluntarily come together to create organisations and institutions.
c) The individual’s voluntary takes up social issues and get combined with people having same interest and try to solve it and draws the attention of State towards it.
d) It is active citizenship.
e) It includes political parties, media Institutions, trade unions, non-governmental organisations, religious organisations and various other kinds of collective entities.
f) The Civil Society is not the organisation controlled by State but they are not purely commercial profit making entity also.