socioeconomic backgrounds. Universal suffrage, along with universal education would make society more democratic. An educated electorate would understand politics and the economy and make wise decisions. By the 1960s, public education advocates argued that educating working people to a higher level (using tools such as the G.I. Bill) would complete the transition to a deliberative democracy. This position is well developed by political philosopher Benjamin R. Barber in Strong Democracy: Participatory Politics for a New Age, published in 1984 and republished in 2003. According to Barber, multicultural education in public schools would promote acceptance of diversity. Meira Levinson argued that "multicultural education is saddled with so many different conceptions that it is inevitably self-contradictory both in theory and in practice, it cannot simultaneously achieve all of the goals it is called upon to serve" According to Banks, "a major goal of multicultural education is to change teaching and learning approaches so that students of both genders and from diverse cultural, ethnic, and language groups will have equal opportunities to learn in educational institutions." Levinson described the rationale for multicultural education as: from learning about other cultures comes tolerance, tolerance promotes respect, respect leads to open mindedness which results in civic reasonableness and equality. James Banks James Banks, former president of the National Council for the Social Studies and the American Educational Research Association, describes the balancing forces, stating, "Citizenship education must be transformed in the 21st Century because of the deepening racial, ethnic, cultural, language and religious diversity in nation-states around the world. Citizens in a diverse democratic society should be able to maintain attachments to their cultural communities as well as participate effectively in the shared national culture. Unity without diversity results in cultural repression and hegemony. Diversity without unity leads to Balkanization and the fracturing of the nation-state. Diversity and unity should coexist in a delicate balance in democratic multicultural nation-states." Campbell and Baird wrote, "Planning curriculum for schools in a multicultural democracy involves making some value choices. Schools are not neutral. The schools were established and funded to promote democracy and citizenship. A pro-democracy position is not neutral; teachers should help schools promote diversity. The myth of school neutrality comes from a poor understanding of the philosophy of positivism. Rather than neutrality, schools should plan and teach cooperation, mutual respect, the dignity of individuals and related democratic values. Schools, particularly integrated schools, provide a rich site where