Krocken mellan idealism och pragmatism - en studie om attityder och förhållningssätt till det mångkulturella samhället

Sammanfattning: The Swedish people’s attitude towards multiculturalism is generally positive and has been so for a long period of time. In recent years attitudes have become increasingly polarized between those who are positive and negative. The multicultural project is subject to an increasingly sharp criticism. The purpose of this study is to investigate attitudes and life practices within a specific group, a group which some consider to be an elite of knowledge in this context, university lecturers. The study examines whether the attitudes and life practices are in agreement or whether there is a discrepancy between the two. The theoretical outset for the study has been Pierre Bourdieu's theory of social space, habitus, capital forms and social positions. The result shows that all informants have a positive attitude towards multiculturalism. At the same time, their life practice is strongly characterized by a culturally homogeneous way of life and the encounter with other cultures in the Swedish context is very marginal, which is generally also forwarded to their children. In other words, there is a distinct discrepancy between attitude and life practice. Thus, there is a risk that the position of agents with a different cultural heritage, on the basis of lack of symbolic capital, will be entrenched far down in the social space.