Canadians like to think they know something about immigration. Over the years, the ideas behind our multicultural approach have been praised around the world. But what can we learn about ourselves from the way we welcome others? It's a timely question. At the G-20 conference in Turkey last month Prime Minister Justin Trudeau reminded the world that Canadians see diversity as a source of strength. We don't define our country through a national identity, he said, but through shared values. Some see these views as little more than dated clichés. Multiculturalism made sense when most of our immigrants came from Europe, they will say, because these “shared values” are mainly tenets of liberal democracy, which Europeans already accepted. That is no longer the case. Today, a majority of immigrants come from countries with very different religious and political views. They may be patriarchal, oppose gay rights, spurn religious rivals, and even preach insurgence. According to the critics, multiculturalism actually slows integration by encouraging immigrants to cling to their old ways. The alternative everyone is talking about is the “secularist” approach, which seeks to confine religion to private life by eliminating displays of religious diversity from public spaces in order to encourage integration. France has been a leader in this movement, having banned religious apparel or displays from government offices, public schools and hospitals and even restricted the broadcasting of traditional religious messages. Lots of Canadians believe secularism is also the best path for Canada, as we saw in the recent debates over Quebec's proposed Charter of Values and the niqab in the last federal election. But the secularist approach has problems of its own. For one thing, the line between private and public turns out to be almost impossible to draw. It sounds easy enough to say that burkas or turbans should be banned from public places, but things get complicated very quickly. What about Christmas trees? Or pentacle earrings, which could be seen as occult religious symbols? Should streets or cities be named after saints? Is atheism a religion? Moreover, governments have a tendency to exempt their own religious symbols from the ban. Thus Quebec's Charter of Values would have banned the hijab from public offices, but allowed the crucifix to remain in the National Assembly on the grounds that it was “part of Quebec culture.” Critics rightly saw this as a double standard. Finally, in countries like France the effectiveness of secularism is less than clear. Rather than integrating into their new communities, many immigrants have withdrawn into enclaves where they huddle with others who share their ways. Perhaps the best way to sum up the case against secularism is to say that it focuses on the symptom rather than the cause. Challenging how people dress in public does little to encourage them to revisit any inappropriate values or beliefs. It is more likely to make them feel singled out and defensive; and perhaps even to push the issue of values underground. This seems to be the situation in France. If the goal is to get immigrants to revisit unacceptable beliefs and to integrate into mainstream society, Canadian multiculturalism deserves a second look. It offers a way of getting at the issue of cultural change that secularism simply can't match. The approach has two parts. First, Trudeau is quite right that Canadians don't have a national identity in the same sense as the French or Germans (Quebec see itself as the exception here). As a result, we neither expect immigrants to convert to one (Quebec does), nor fret over the potential loss of it, the way, say, the French or Germans do. When it comes to integration, the advantage this provides is clarity and flexibility. On one hand, the lack of concern over a national identity brings the things we do care about—our shared values—into sharp focus. At the same time, it creates the cultural space immigrants need to find their own solutions to conflicts, which brings us to the second part: generational change. The real genius of the Canadian approach lies in the way this openness around identity leads to a natural filtering out or transformation of values and beliefs that conflict with our shared values. Youth are the key to this. Young people have proven remarkably responsive to multiculturalism. At home, they are exposed to the traditional customs and values of their parents. Through school, friends and media, they learn about the values of Canadian society, including gender equality, social mobility and personal freedom. As a result, these first-generation Canadians grow up internalizing aspects of two distinct and often conflicting approaches to life. As their identities develop, they discuss and debate how these worlds fit together. Where necessary, they experiment with and re-engineer parts of their ethnic identity to make it more consistent with Canadians' shared values. This pattern of adjustment and integration worked remarkably well with the Scots, Irish and Italians, to name only a few groups. All were viewed with suspicion when they arrived, yet within a generation or two their descendants had moved from the margins to the mainstream. Today, the same pattern is repeating with immigrants from non-democratic countries. For example, during the federal election a number of young Muslim women spoke out about their experience with the hijab. They had abandoned it as teenagers, then began wearing it (or the niqab) again in their twenties and thirties. Although the critics saw this as evidence that Muslims were failing to integrate, they are simply wrong. On the contrary, this is a remarkable success story about integration. First, let's note that these women described their experience as a personal journey aimed at reconciling traditional Muslim values with Canadian values—especially, religious freedom. So they were focused on the question of alignment. Second, they were clear that their decision to wear the hijab was not made out of duty or obedience to religious tradition, but as an expression of their personal commitment to “Islamic values,” such as respect for women. In short, these women reframed the issue in a way that turned the controversy over the hijab (and niqab) inside out, transforming a symbol of patriarchy into a symbol of gender equality. It is an impressive demonstration of cultural ingenuity and adjustment. It also shows how Canadians' openness to diversity creates an environment in which young immigrants like these feel free to explore and redefine their religious identity in ways that let them preserve their customs, while bringing them into closer alignment with our shared values. And that is multiculturalism at its best. It is also about as Canadian as you can get.   Dr. Don Lenihan is Senior Associate, Policy and Engagement, at Canada 2020, Canada's leading, independent progressive think-tank. Don is an internationally recognized expert on democracy and Open Government. He is currently the Government of Ontario's principal advisor on its Open Dialogue Initiative. The views expressed here are those of the columnist alone. Don can be reached at:[email protected] or follow him on Twitter at: @DonLenihan