In Peter Stahel’s recent The New Daily column The left brought a thesaurus to a knife fight, he writes about the competing “mental models” of social cohesion operating in Australia.

The populist assimilationist one and the inclusivist one.

He says the latter abstract and values-based view overlooks the housing, wages and taxation grievances of those who are attracted to the simple assimilationist view of social cohesion.

By failing to engage with and acknowledge the grievances of these many Australians, the inclusive view is losing ground to the view that proposes that migrants are taking our jobs and homes.

Stahel’s thesis about this cleavage in Australian society, at a stage when social cohesion is so important to us moving forward together and responding to the many problems we face, is perceptive.

Social cohesion is a very abstract concept, and there are many definitions. None is simply wrong, but unless we make a careful deliberate choice about what we mean by the concept, we risk predetermining what we discuss, what we conclude and if in fact we engage productively at all.

Unfortunately, it is most common for “social cohesion” to be defined as mainly being about migration.

For example, the current government explains it on a Department of Home Affairs webpage titled “About social cohesion” like this:

Australia is a diverse society with a rich Indigenous heritage and a successful migration history. We are proud of our Indigenous cultures, which are........

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