Introduction

Religious and ethnic minority groups contribute to the richness of a pluralistic society. One of the most important rights for such a group is to preserve its separate identity. It cannot do so unless it maintains its continuity by educating its children to understand and respect its own customs, religion and culture. They can then mature into adult members of the group, with a commitment to its future preservation. Nevertheless, when the educational rights of the children of minority groups are considered, a number of competing considerations become apparent. Indeed, a familiar dilemma arises, although in this context it is even more acute, how to find a suitable means of ensuring that parents' rights do not override those of their children.

Overarching this discussion is a more fundamental question regarding minority groups' relationships with mainstream society. An acceptable compromise must always be found between the views of extreme pluralists who maintain the absolute right of minority groups to preserve all the elements of their cultural traditions, and those of assimilationists who expect minorities to be absorbed into the culture of the mainstream community. As Poulter comments, the compromise adopted in Britain has been to promote a ‘cultural pluralism within limits’. This reflects the pervading view that a democratic pluralist society should support the cultures and lifestyles of its ethnic groups, whilst expecting all groups to accept a set of shared values distinctive of that society as a whole.