1.4 Conclusions
In illustrating and describing all of these different issues with respect to
career mobility, visible minorities and official languages policies, three
fundamental conclusions emerge:
1. That there are problems, both perceived and real in how the public service
confronts and deals with these three issues. This research process has provided
evidence of continued issues attributable to communications and understanding
surrounding these policies that appear to have a direct impact on public
servants' attitudes and acceptance. We can clearly assert that official
languages policies remain imperfectly understood, and far from widely endorsed.
In such a climate, it is not surprising to have encountered some negativity
among participants relative to these questions. This negativity is directly
responsible for what we observed in terms of active resistance and hostility
toward the actual, systemic barriers that the official languages policies do
impose.
2. That visible minorities, as a group, do indeed experience career mobility
barriers, but that these emerge more as a function of organizational culture and
attitudes from co-workers than as a function of specific language-related
policies. In a parallel fashion, our findings also suggest that these issues
tend to affect public servants who are recent immigrants more than visible
minorities in general.
3. That despite the existence and impact of the above two conclusions, nowhere
in this process have we heard evidence to suggest that a specific official
languages problem exists solely for visible minorities. The problems these
public servants encounter are, from the perspective of participants themselves,
no different, and no less reasonable or unfair for them than they are for
everyone else.
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