This paper analyzes ethnic pluralism and integration based on Talcott Parsons’ works. In a 1965 essay on «full citizenship» of Black Americans in the US, Harvard’s sociologist identifies the attainment of a minority ethnic group’s social rights as the only way to achieve full inclusion. This analysis shows a less conservative and conformist side of the scholar, compared to the more common profile associated with the great American theorist who proposes a modern, although largely unrealized, vision of the future.