MULTICULTURALISM AS A FACTOR IN THE DEMOCRATIC DEVELOPMENT OF SOCIETY AND DEVELOPMENT OF CYBERSPACE IN THE CONTEXT OF CONTEMPORARY ETHNOPOLITICS
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.32689/2523-4625-2025-4(80)-5Keywords:
Theories of multiculturalism, democracy, cultural diversity, social integration, civil society, digitalization, cyberspace, cyberprotestAbstract
The article examines the phenomenon of multiculturalism as one of the key factors in the democratic development of modern society. It analyses conceptual approaches to multiculturalism in the context of Western philosophical and political thought and traces the transformation of ideas of multiculturalism in the political practices of different countries. The influence of cultural diversity on the legitimisation of democratic institutions, the formation of civic identity and the development of inclusive policies is substantiated. The article draws on the experience of countries such as the United States, Canada, Great Britain, the Netherlands and Sweden, where multiculturalism is or has been an element of state policy. The article emphasises that the current state of ethnic policy requires a fundamental review aimed at rethinking traditional approaches and forming new priorities. This process is impossible without a thorough analysis of existing and well-established theories of multiculturalism, which remain the basic conceptual foundation. At the same time, modern realities necessitate the development of new models of co-regulation that not only build on previous theoretical achievements but also adequately respond to the challenges of cyberspace. The latter is characterised by phenomena such as hybridity, nomadism, temporality, anonymity, and in some cases, desubjectivised cyberpsychosis, which gives rise to qualitatively new risks and mechanisms of social interaction. It is noted that the cyber revolution is a process of comprehensive automation of technological practices, within which the desubjectification of the individual and the narrowing of their opportunities for self-determination take place. Under such conditions, cyberspace appears not as a new arena for regulating ethnopolitical relations, but rather as an accelerator of their disintegration. Instead of performing an integrated function, digital technologies contribute to the fragmentation of public space, perpetuating multiple and isolated, and sometimes radicalised microcommunities, which, in turn, are characterised by the rejection of universal normative systems, the delegitimisation of state institutions and the formation of alternative, often post-national identities that complicate the processes of political consolidation and social integration.
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