Vanishing Mediators

The expulsion of Ugandan Asians in 1972 coincided with the formal and informal development of multiculturalism as state policy and as shibboleth, while their arrival in places like Canada and Britain accelerated or compelled its advance. In both contexts, Uganda's Asians as well as cognate communities from Kenya and Tanzania are often seen as one of multiculturalism's ostensible success stories, even though in Britain they have also become some of its most visible critics. This essay suggests that the history of the expulsion is intimately rather than only accidentally connected to that of multiculturalism. It traces the conceptual links between the colonial “multiracialism” that defined the contexts in East Africa from where the Asians were expelled and what is today called multiculturalism. It makes the case that both might be better understood in relation to the persistent problem of mediation, as well as the uncertain place of mediating groups themselves.