Unfortunately, the very suggestion to identify in- and out-groups is bound to ruffle quite a few feathers and invite criticisms of ‘parochiality’, ‘narrow-mindedness’ and so on and so forth, but the fact is that even in the contemporary ‘modern’ and ‘liberal’ world, these are the very issues that public discourse, law and policymaking revolve around, especially when questions of heritage, identity and access to resources are involved. Neither modernity nor liberalism has been able to do away with ‘identity politics’.
