Eu finalmente resolvi isso. Havia uma dependência circular: ia32-libs-multiarch: i386 depende da libsane: i386 e vice-versa. O apt-get se recusa a remover um dos dois porque depende do outro. Também se recusa a removê-los, se você especificar ambos na mesma linha de comando. Por exemplo:
sudo apt-get remove libsane:i386 ia32-libs-multiarch:i386
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
Package libsane:i386 is not installed, so not removed
You might want to run 'apt-get -f install' to correct these:
The following packages have unmet dependencies.
ia32-libs : Depends: ia32-libs-multiarch
E: Unmet dependencies. Try 'apt-get -f install' with no packages (or specify a solution).
No entanto, irá permitir que você instale ambos, se você especificá-los na mesma linha de comando:
sudo apt-get install libsane:i386 ia32-libs-multiarch:i386
Reading package lists... Done
Building dependency tree
Reading state information... Done
ia32-libs-multiarch:i386 is already the newest version.
The following packages were automatically installed and are no longer required:
language-pack-kde-en kde-l10n-engb language-pack-kde-en-base
Use 'apt-get autoremove' to remove them.
Suggested packages:
hpoj:i386 hplip:i386 libsane-extras:i386 sane-utils:i386
The following NEW packages will be installed
libsane:i386
0 upgraded, 1 newly installed, 0 to remove and 7 not upgraded.
2 not fully installed or removed.
Need to get 0 B/3,554 kB of archives.
After this operation, 8,503 kB of additional disk space will be used.
Do you want to continue [Y/n]?
(Reading database ... 479536 files and directories currently installed.)
Unpacking libsane:i386 (from .../libsane_1.0.22-7ubuntu1_i386.deb) ...
Setting up libsane:i386 (1.0.22-7ubuntu1) ...
Setting up ia32-libs-multiarch:i386 (20090808ubuntu36) ...
Setting up ia32-libs (20090808ubuntu36) ...
Processing triggers for libc-bin ...
ldconfig deferred processing now taking place
Depois disso, as coisas estão de volta e eu posso remover ia32-libs-multiarch: i386 novamente.