Arthur M. Schlesinger Jr. was a historian and former special assistant to President John F. Kennedy. He authored several books on history and politics and was a leading liberal intellectual. In his 1992 book "The Disuniting of America", Schlesinger was critical of multiculturalism and argued that promoting separate ethnic identities and myths as facts risked further dividing and disuniting American society. He believed culture pluralism should not come at the expense of a shared civic culture and viewed ethnicity as a cause of breaking nations.