Australia as a Multicultural State (Essay Sample)

Discuss THREE reasons why Australia is a successful multicultural society. Include reference to intercultural communication.
Introduction
Brislin (1993, p.4) defines culture as a composition of values, ideologies and assumptions shared amongst a number of people that guide them in their day-to-day lives. A multicultural Society is a society made up of different cultures. Multicultural societies are constantly characterised by nepotism and corruption that bring about conflict within the society. This makes it important to study why the Australian Society is successful despite being a multi-cultural society.
Why Australia is a successful Multiracial Society.
In contrast to the earlier multiracial segregation practises and the genocide of the aboriginals by the early settlers. Australia has slowly evolved to become a peaceful multicultural society that accommodates foreigners easily. This society has been successful because of the following factors.
The Australian government Policies and Institutions.
Koleth (2011, pp.14-39) states that, the government through the ministry of settlement and multicultural affairs has taken an active part in formulation of policies that guide multicultural relations and cooperation. These policies ensures interaction between various cultures to create cultural awareness. The ministry organizes activities such as multicultural arts, festival grants and multicultural youth sports partnership program. This gives Australians a chance to experience different cultures which brings about cooperative existence.
Australian government established a multicultural council that conducts research and advisory on multicultural policy. The Institution also acts as a champion for a multicultural state. It advises the government in order to formulate and implement multicultural friendly policies and enhance future intercultural communications (Matas et al. 2009, pp. 382-390).
Government has enacted policies that give rights and freedom to practise one’s culture as long as it doesn’t harm human life or interfere with other people. The same policies also protect citizens from discrimination against their culture, race, gender and religion. This has reduced social frictions and violence in the society that may arise due to one or more groups of people feeling culturally oppressed (Fact Sheet 6, 2011).
Cultural Homogeneity
Despite the many cultures in Australia, they practise almost the same way of life. Bouma et al. (2011, pp. 23-30) argue that religion has acted as unification code between different people from different cultures. Christians view themselves as brothers, so do secularists have a common culture characterised by liberalism. This makes Australians to behave within a predictable way of life that is common among them.
Religion encourages humans to be tolerant and accommodate one another. This is the case of 60.9% of the Australian population who are Christians. 20% are secularist who believe in rationale and liberal ideologies. 1.2% are Muslims and the remaining population are Buddhist and Hindus (Macmillan, 2006, pp.20-50). All these denominations share a same believe of living in a peaceful existence. Which has attributed to the successful multicultural communication within Australia (Cahill et al. 2004, pp.22-67)
Education.
According to National Review (2015) 90% of Australians are literate. Hartman and Holdsworth (2009, pp.84-90) argues that education acts as a key element toward cohesion within a multicultural society. According to them education empowers people to make them appreciate cultural diversity and respect one other. By this virtue almost every citizen in Australia acknowledges the importance of a multicultural society and its benefits. They uphold human rights and accommodate cultural diversity. Australia being a society with a high literacy level, they appreciate multiculturalism and embrace societal cohesion and intercultural communication.
Learning in itself cultivates a set of expected behaviour among people. Scholars such as Norton (2014, p.37) have referred to these behaviour as civilization. According to him civilized people uphold norms such as respect for one another. Norms within the civilized people help in peaceful co-existence despite of the respective cultures in the society that they may originate from. (Institute of culture and Society, 2011, pp.25-31)
In the processes of learning different students converge in a classroom to achieve a common goal and shared knowledge. Cooperation between these students makes them to understand each other despite their different cultures. This helps in future prospects of social cohesion and intercultural communications among the young and the youths. (Australian Multicultural Council, 2013, pp.6-20)
CONCLUSION.
The Australian society led by the government have been in the fore front to fight cultural discriminations and ensure that there is peaceful existence within the society. Minority cultures have been given special rights to get equal representation in the government. They have also been protected to avoid assimilation by the dominant cultures and give them a sense of identity. The liberal norms created by the society has allowed accommodation of various cultures within Australia. These factors brought together have enabled Australia exist as peaceful multicultural society with an improved intercultural communication.
References.
Australian Multicultural Council. 2013. Report on Multiculturalism and Social Cohesion in Australian Neighbourhoods, pp. 6-20. [Online] Available at /__data/assets/pdf_file/0006/22965/The_Australian...