In what ways is political multiculturalism political?

Multiculturalism understood as the accommodation of minority groups, e.g. through group rights, exemptions, or policies of recognition, have been discussed in political philosophy for over three decades. Many prominent theoretical defenses of multiculturalism are applications of more general liberal, libertarian, democratic or egalitarian theories to specific issues related to diversity, e.g. Will Kymlicka, Chandran Kukathas, Iris Young, Seyla Benhabib. However, not all theories of multiculturalism are like this. The so-called Bristol School of Multiculturalism seems to be an example of a different kind of defense of multiculturalism. Its prominent representatives, such as Bhikhu Parekh and Tariq Modood, stress that their multiculturalism does not presuppose liberal principles and is not, more generally, an application of more abstract principles. Parekh and Modood rather stress the actual claims making of minority groups in specific societies and the need for intercultural dialogue about these claims. This raises questions about how we should understand such defenses of multiculturalism, which Modood on several occasions has labelled as ‘political multiculturalism’. The question is in what sense defenses of multiculturalism like those of the Bristol School of Multiculturalism can be said to be ‘political’ and what this means for the normative policy proposals arrived at on this basis. One can interpret what might characterize ‘political multiculturalism’ as a type of theoretical defense of multiculturalism in several different ways. Some interpretations concern the subject matter of the view defended, but several ways of understanding political multiculturalism interprets the ‘political’ in methodological terms. Despite Parekh and Modood’s rejection of liberalism as an overarching doctrine, there are ways in which their defense of multiculturalism is political in a sense similar to Rawls’s political liberalism. Their rejection of attempts to derive multiculturalism from abstract principles is furthermore similar to the political realist criticism of political philosophy as applied ethics. This leads to the further question whether political multiculturalism resembles political realism in ways that are more positive as well and what this might imply for the normative status of the resultant policy proposals.