The UK's experiment in multiculturalism has many critics, all from within the UK, most (but not all) from the indigenous ethnic 'English' population.  The start of the major influx of others from around the world began with the UK colonising nearly one third of the world and grandly giving these mostly-oppressed peoples the right to British citizenship.  This casual hand-out has now been withdrawn but it illustrated the quandary over nationality which is more widespread across the world than many realise..............  Who are the real Australians; the New Zealanders; the Israelis; who are the Kurds if there is no Kurdish country; who are the ethnic Russians and the Serbo-Croats; and the many 'nationalities' now within the Chinese empire or the Spanish nation?

Check what Wikipedia says:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nationality

But the big angry argument over a new law in Arizona also illustrates painfully the confusion between, ethnicity, nationality and citizenship.  The 'citizens' and residents of that US state will now have to produce their identity documents on demand by the police or face six months in jail.  Show me your papers, the phrase invented by the Nazis, will become common in this part of the nation of the free.

The new law has been introduced because of the concern over 'immigrants', estimated to be over 30% of the population.  Of course, by immigrants the white majority mean Latinos who, they feel should not be in their state.  But  Arizona was annexed in the 1846/48 war between the US and Mexico as were Texas, California, Nevada, Utah and parts of Colorado, New Mexico and Wyoming.  There was no legal basis for this capture of these vast lands.

So, many of Mexican origin would argue, they should be asking the whites for their papers and not the other way around.

Reminds me of the Americans demanding that the British get out of Ireland.  In a riotous debate on US radio, I once posed the illogicality of asking an ethnic group to leave a territory when the vast majority of the population identified with that 'occupier', in this case the UK.  The storm erupted when I asked what would happen if Mexico demanded the return of Texas despite the overwhelming certainly that most Texans would wish to be American and not Mexican.

Or the Argentine claim to the Falklands/Malvinas which they never occupied and were not interested in , yet a nation thousand s of miles away did and was .............

Multiculturalisms may be many things but simple it is not .............

Roger Haywood is a leading media commentator on issues.  He is the only person to have chaired both the Chartered Institute of Public Relations and the Chartered Institute of Marketing.  He also helped form and chaired the world's largest network of independent business communications consultancies.

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