Books In Brief.

Diversity and Distrust: Civic Education in a Multicultural Society, by Stephen Macedo (Harvard, 384 pp., $45)

How should a democratic society balance respect for pluralism with the need to build the shared political and cultural values that make democracy possible? To answer this important question, Princeton's Stephen Macedo proposes a "tough-minded liberalism" that appreciates "diversity," but places limits on groups that represent a threat to democratic values. Other than advocating the use of reason, however, it is unclear what criteria he would apply to determine which groups pose such a threat. While his subtitle suggests a general anxiety over the way genuine pluralism has been transmogrified into multiculturalism and identity politics, Macedo seems to be distressed primarily by people who hold strong religious beliefs.

Macedo stresses the importance of public schools as wellsprings of civic education in a diverse society. He attempts to illustrate this point with a thoroughly revisionist history of the 19th-century "school wars" between the Protestant-dominated "common school" movement and the Roman Catholic minority. The culprit of his story is Archbishop John Hughes of New York, who rejected public schools be cause he wanted his parishioners educated in Catholic schools. While Macedo concedes that the common-school movement was en- tangled with racism, nativism, and anti-Catholic bigotry, and notes that Catholic children were beaten for refusing to read the King James version of the Bible, he wonders why the archbishop wasn't more understanding. After all, there was a "legitimate civic purpose" at stake.

Archbishop Hughes should have gone along with the "ecumenical, non- sectarian religion" taught in the public schools of his day, Macedo says, and religious parents today should accept the prevailing secular liberalism. Macedo puts his hope in the transformative project undertaken by public schools, which he says can rescue children from the religion of their parents. "Shouldn't we worry about parental tyranny as well as government tyranny?" he asks.

It therefore comes as a surprise when, at the end of the book, Macedo comes out in favor of school choice as a way to save inner-city children from failing public schools. He goes on to acknowledge that many Catholic schools do a better job than their public counterparts when it comes to educating urban students and fostering a common civic culture. These conclusions-surprising from a liberal academic-belie much of what comes before. One must wonder why a scholar of Macedo's stature went to such lengths to misconstrue history when the most compelling evidence in support of pluralism and choice is right before his eyes.