Anglican Communion News Service - Digest News

The Archbishop of Canterbury, Dr Rowan Williams, gave an address at Toynbee Hall, in which he will call for a widening of the debate on multiculturalism beyond narrow considerations of ethnicity or nationality, and to take in arguments about globalisation and commerce.

Delivering the 2007 Barnett Lecture, Dr Williams addressed the question of the homogenisation of human beings, with the increasing dominance of the global market:

‘We live in probably the least multicultural human environment there has ever been. The global market has canonised once and for all certain ways of making: industrialisation is everywhere, the network of global communication is everywhere, the effects of market forces are felt by everyone on the face of the globe….It may be benevolent to some aspects of local cultures; it may learn to speak in local accents for certain purposes, advertising or decoration but it works in one mode of production, employment and marketing, and assumes that everyone is a potential customer. It is as universal as ever Christianity or Islam aspired to be, but the substance of its universality is a set of human functions (producing, selling, consuming) rather than any sense of innate human capacity and of the unsettling mysteriousness that goes with that.’

He will cite two examples of counter-cultural trends that are beginning to question this world view: the growth of environmental consciousness and ethical consumerism; and the emergence of microfinance schemes, such as those pioneered by Nobel prize winner, Muhammad Yunus.

Archbishop Williams will also argue in his lecture that those who wish to debate multiculturalism should first look critically at what they mean by the term. He will suggest that the growth of cultural relativism in the twentieth century has led many to feel unable or reluctant to question the values of their own communities or those of others and that this risks the development of a secular state, which is unable and unwilling to exercise moral judgement.

Archbishop Williams will stress that it is not wrong to expect schools in shared cultures to teach the history or traditions of the majority. This, he will say, is necessary not because it is arbitrarily right to do so, but because children need to be able to understand how cultures evolve - and what forces, for good or ill, have come together to explain the values and traditions society currently holds.

Notes for editors:

Toynbee Hall produces practical innovative programmes for young people and families, adults, and older people, to meet the needs of local people, improve conditions and enable communities to fulfil their potential. Based in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, Toynbee Hall makes a difference by producing local programmes that have the power to become national solutions, with a constant and ongoing commitment to the development of social policy and networks for positive change.

Toynbee Hall provides a platform for influential speakers of the day to air their views on current trends in society and social policy. These events have a real value in bridging the divide between the intellectual and material affluence of the Capital and the physical impoverishment of the surrounding area.

For further information about Toynbee Hall visit www.toynbeehall.org.uk.