To fully respond to the demands of multiculturalism, a view of toleration would need to duly respect diversity both at the level of the application of principles of toleration and at the level of the justificatory foundations that a view of toleration may appeal to. The paper examines Rainer Forst’s post-Rawlsian, ‘reason-based’ attempt to provide a view of toleration that succeeds at these two levels and so allows us to tolerate tolerantly. His account turns on the (...) view that a constructivist requirement of generality and reciprocity provides a suitable criterion of toleration since a commitment to this requirement is part of what defines people as reasonable. But it is neither plausible nor coherent to build such a requirement into an idea of reasonableness from which an account of toleration starts. Thus, constructivism cannot provide a tolerant criterion of toleration, if such criterion, in order to overcome the ‘paradox’ of intolerant toleration, must escape reasonable disagreement. (shrink)
Attempting to settle various debates from recent literature regarding its precise nature, I offer a detailed conceptual analysis of toleration. I begin by isolating toleration from other notions; this provides us some guidance by introducing the eight definitional conditions of toleration that I then explicate and defend. Together, these eight conditions indicate that toleration is an agent’s intentional and principled refraining from interfering with an opposed other (or their behavior, etc.) in situations of diversity, where the (...) agent believes she has the power to interfere. This non-normative definition can serve as a preliminary to normative discussions of toleration. (shrink)
Is toleration a requirement of morality or a dictate of prudence? What limits are there to toleration? What is required of us if we are to promote a truly tolerant society? These themes--the grounds, limits, and requirements of toleration--are central to this book, which presents the W.B. Morrell Memorial Lectures on Toleration, given in 1986 at the University of York. Covering a wide range of practical and theoretical issues, the contributors--including F.A. Hayek, Maurice Cranston, and Karl (...) Popper--consider the philosophical difficulties inherent in the concept as well as the practical problems of implementing a policy of toleration. Although the contributors differ in their conclusions about the grounds of toleration, they all share a belief in the importance of the concept both historically and in modern society. (shrink)
This paper rereads David Hume's Dialogues Concerning Natural Religion as dramatising a distinctive, naturalistic account of toleration. I have two purposes in mind: first, to complete and ground Hume's fragmentary explicit discussion of toleration; second, to unearth a potentially attractive alternative to more recent, Rawlsian approaches to toleration. To make my case, I connect Dialogues and the problem of toleration to the wider themes of naturalism, scepticism and their relation in Hume's thought, before developing a new (...) interpretation of Dialogues part 12 as political drama. Finally, I develop the Humean theory of toleration I have discovered by comparison between Rawls's and Hume's strategies for justification of a tolerant political regime. (shrink)
What motivated an absolutist Erastian who rejected religious freedom, defended uniform public worship, and deemed the public expression of disagreement a catalyst for war to endorse a movement known to history as the champion of toleration, no coercion in religion, and separation of church and state? At least three factors motivated Hobbes’s 1651 endorsement of Independency: the Erastianism of Cromwellian Independency, the influence of the politique tradition, and, paradoxically, the contribution of early-modern practices of toleration to maintaining the (...) public sphere’s religious uniformity. The third factor illustrates how a key function of the emerging private sphere in the early-modern period was to protect uniformity, rather than diversity; it also shows that what was novel was not so much the public/private distinction itself, but the separation of two previously conflated dimensions of publicity – visibility and representativeness – that enabled early-modern Europeans to envisage modes of worship out in the open, yet still private. (shrink)
This book outlines the social, conceptual, and psychological preconditions for toleration.By looking closely at the religious wars of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries in France and England and at contemporary controversies about the rights of homosexuals, Richard Dees demonstrates how trust between the opposing parties is needed first, but in just these cases, distrust is all-too-rational. Ultimately, that distrust can only be overcome if the parties undergo a fundamental shift of values - a conversion. Only then can they accept (...) some form of toleration. (shrink)
Philosophical Commentary on the Words of the Gospel 'Compel Them to Come In', written by the Protestant philosopher Pierre Bayle in 1686-88, was a classic statement of the case for toleration at a time of extreme persecution. This collection of Kilcullen's writings on Bayle's work examines a wide range of 17th-century religious and philosophical issues, including Bayle's arguments, Arnauld's attack on Jesuit moral theories similar to Bayle's, the uses and limitations of "reciprocity" arguments, the "ethics of belief," and questions (...) of moral responsibility and free will. (shrink)
Toleration has a rich tradition in Western political philosophy. It is, after all, one of the defining topics of political philosophy—historically pivotal in the development of modern liberalism, prominent in the writings of such canonical figures as John Locke and John Stuart Mill, and central to our understanding of the idea of a society in which individuals have the right to live their own lives by their own values, left alone by the state so long as they respect the (...) similar interests of others. -/- Toleration and Its Limits, the latest addition to the NOMOS series, explores the philosophical nuances of the concept of toleration and its scope in contemporary liberal democratic societies. Editors Melissa S. Williams and Jeremy Waldron carefully compiled essays that address the tradition's key historical figures; its role in the development and evolution of Western political theory; its relation to morality, liberalism, and identity; and its limits and dangers. -/- Contributors: Lawrence A. Alexander, Kathryn Abrams, Wendy Brown, Ingrid Creppell, Noah Feldman, Rainer Forst, David Heyd, Glyn Morgan, Glen Newey, Michael A. Rosenthal, Andrew Sabl, Steven D. Smith, and Alex Tuckness. (shrink)
Introduction JOHN HORTON AND SUSAN MENDUS The essays in this volume are concerned with the theoretical and conceptual issues involved in the idea of ...
Our time is characterized by what seems like an unprecedented process of intense global homogenization. This reality provides the context for exploring the nature and value of toleration. Hence, this essay is meant primarily as a contribution to international ethics rather than political philosophy. It is argued that because of the non-eliminability of differences in the world we should not even hope that there can be only one global religion or ideology. Further exploration exposes conceptual affinity between the concepts (...) of intolerance, ideology, and doctrinal evil. The last concept is developed in contrast to pure evil and average evil, and under the assumption of the metaphysical necessity of free will. Doctrinal evil is found to represent the main source of intolerance as a result of a mechanism that tends to confuse doctrinal evil (or the competing conceptions of the good) with pure evil. This connection between doctrinal evil and pure evil provides ideologies with their forcefulness. Tolerance cannot be properly understood in terms of a simple opposition to intolerance, however. Tolerance emerges as a sort of vigilance, conscientiousness, and non-negligence based not on a supposedly correct interpretation of the good, but rather on the acceptance of the fallibility of any such attempted definition. Conversely, the principal evil in doctrinal evil is found in arrogance that accompanies the intolerance-inducing irresponsible thoughtlessness. With this conceptual topology in mind the paper also addresses questions regarding religious tolerance, the ideology of human rights and democracy, the right to self-defense, ways to face evil, the dialectics of using old names for novel evils, and related issues. (shrink)
Political liberals now defend what Rawls calls the "inclusive view" of public reason with the appropriate ideal of reasonable pluralism. Against the application of such a liberal conception of toleration to deliberative democracy "the open view of toleration is with no constraints" is the only regime of toleration that can be democratically justified. Recent debates about the public or nonpublic character of religious reasons provide a good test case and show why liberal deliberative theories are intolerant and (...) fail to live up to democratic obligations to provide justifications to all members of the deliberative community. In a deliberative democracy, accommodations to religious minorities must be based on transformations in the current reflective equilibrium among the norms that make up the complex democratic ideal. This is not merely a conceptual enterprise of commensuration, since the need for any such transformation in standards of justification is due to changes in the nature of the polity itself, changes that in turn modify its regime of toleration. (shrink)
Toleration is perhaps the core commitment of liberalism, but this seemingly simple feature of liberal societies creates tension for liberal perfectionists, who are committed to justifying religious toleration primarily in terms of the goods and flourishing it promotes. Perfectionists, so it seems, should recommend restricting harmful religious practices when feasible. If such restrictions would promote liberal perfectionist values like autonomy, it is unclear how the perfectionist can object. A contemporary liberal perfectionist, Steven Wall, has advanced defense of religious (...)toleration that grounds perfectionist toleration in an innovative account of reasons of respect. He thus defends perfectionist toleration on two grounds: (i) the appropriate manner of responding to perfectionist goods like autonomy and membership is to respect the religious choices of others; (ii) citizens can acquire reasons to respect the religious choices of others through internalizing a value-promoting moral and political code. I argue that both defenses fail. The cornerstone of both arguments is the connection Wall draws between reasons to promote value and reasons to respect it. I claim that Wall’s conception of the relationship between promoting and respecting value is inadequate. I conclude that the failure of Wall’s defense of perfectionist toleration should motivate liberal perfectionists to develop more sophisticated accounts of normative reasons. The viability of a truly liberal perfectionism depends upon such developments. (shrink)
Although tolerance is widely regarded as a virtue of both individuals and groups that modern democratic and multiculturalist societies cannot do without, there is still much disagreement among political thinkers as to what tolerance demands, or what can be done to create and sustain a culture of tolerance. The philosophical literature on toleration contains three main strands. (1) An agreement that a tolerant society is more than a modus vivendi; (2) discussion of the proper object(s) of toleration; (3) (...) debate about whether there is a ‘paradox’ of toleration and, if so, how it might be solved. This Introduction outlines how each of the subsequent papers addresses problems in the theory and practice of toleration, in the light of these three strands in the existing literature. (shrink)
This article argues that toleration understood as the principled restraint from the use of force is an instance of RG. Collingwood's 'ideal of civility' towards which liberalism as the process of civilisation aspires. In the first part of this article, Toleration as Civility, I draw on Collingwood's philosophy to provide an account of toleration as an instance of civility embodying self-respect, historical consciousness, and complete freedom of the will. Accordingly, the limits of toleration are conceived as (...) necessarily informed by the level of civilisation in society, and relativism in such limits in society is part of the dynamic of the process of civilisation towards a universal ideal, and not an end state in itself. In the second part, Toleration and 'Absolute Presuppositions', it will be shown that Collingwood's theory of atonement and his assertion of the Christian roots of liberalism supports a view of toleration as a moral 'attitude' which captures the elements of atonement (those being punishment, forgiveness, love and hope), and highlights the relevance of Collingwood's theory of 'absolute presuppositions' to contemporary issues in political philosophy. (shrink)
It is widely agreed, claims John Horton, “that the core of the concept of toleration is the refusal, where one has the power to do so, to prohibit or seriously interfere with conduct one finds objectionable”.1 Liberals champion toleration as one of the main political virtues of a just society. The tolerant society is one which protects a diverse array of fundamental freedoms ranging from freedom of conscience and religion to freedom of expression and freedom of association. Secure (...) in the knowledge that the constitution guarantees these various freedoms, citizens can freely pursue the lifestyles they find most fulfilling, regardless of the fact that the majority of people may or may not find their.. (shrink)
The ?traditional? conception of toleration, understood as the putting up with beliefs and practices by those who disapprove of them, has come under increasing attack in recent years for being negative, condescending and judgemental. Instead, its critics argue for a more positive, affirmative conception, perhaps best captured by Anna Elisabetta Galeotti?s idea of ?toleration as recognition?. In this article, without denying that it is not always the most appropriate form of response to differences, I defend the traditional conception (...) of toleration against its critics. Two principal arguments are advanced in defence of it: the first articulates its role as part of a viable and realistic political theory of modus vivendi, while the second argues that it is only the traditional conception of toleration that makes possible the mutual accommodation of some values that are genuinely antithetical and hostlie to each other. Thus, there remains an important place for the traditional conception of toleration in both political theory and practice. (shrink)
Rawls’s account of international toleration in The Law of Peoples has been the subject of vigorous critiques by critics who believe that he unacceptably dilutes the principles of his Law of Peoples in order to accommodate non-liberal societies. One important component in these critiques takes issue specifically with Rawls’s inclusion of certain non-liberal societies (‘decent peoples’) in the constituency of justification for the Law of Peoples. In Rawls’s defence, I argue that the explanation for the inclusion of decent peoples (...) in the constituency of justification is not, as is standardly assumed, that they are the kind of societies that ought to be tolerated in that way on some prior conception of which kinds of societies ought to be tolerated in that way. The real explanation appeals to a methodological principle underlying Rawls’s approach to political justification, according to which liberals owe justification, as a matter of liberal principle, to those who comply with liberal principles for political institutions that apply to them. If such liberal principles can be complied with by agents who nevertheless cannot accept fully liberal justifications for those principles, then liberalism itself requires liberals to seek justifications which they can accept. This approach gives us a new way to view decent peoples: as just such agents, who are therefore owed a justification for the Law of Peoples that they can accept. Decency is thus a concept that is internal to liberal political justification at the international level. Reading Rawls in this way permits a coherent and attractive defence of his strategy of toleration and of his international theory as a whole. (shrink)
In this essay, I reconstruct tolerance as a moral virtue, by critically analysing its definition, circumstances, justification and limits. I argues that, despite its paradoxical appearance, tolerance qualifies as a virtue, by means of a restriction of its proper object to differences that are chosen. Since this excludes the most important and divisive differences of contemporary pluralism from the scope of the virtue of tolerance, the moral model of toleration cannot constitute the micro-foundation of the corresponding political practice. However, (...) if the political ideal of toleration must be founded on independent political reasons of justice, the moral model can bridge the gap between private morality and public reason, providing citizens with moral motives to supplement the political obligation to neutrality. (shrink)
Rawls's Law of Peoples has not gathered a great deal of public support. The reason for this, I suggest, is that it ignores the differences between the international and domestic realms as regards the methodology of reciprocal agreement. In the domestic realm, reciprocity produces both stability and respect for individual moral agency. In the international realm, we must choose between these two values — seeking stable relations between states, or respect for individual moral agency. Rawls's Law of Peoples ignores the (...) stark nature of this choice by insisting that the only legitimate extension of liberal toleration abroad is the toleration of different forms of political organization. It is this attempt to overcome liberalism's tragic dilemma which, I suggest, has made Rawls's international theory less attractive than his domestic theory. I also suggest that this difficulty is at the base of the further difficulties identified by Henry Shue and Martha Nussbaum in their accompanying essays. Key Words: Rawls • international • toleration • reciprocity • state • Nussbaum • Shue. (shrink)
This introduction considers recent work in toleration; the nature and definition of toleration; and the relationship between toleration and broader questions of political philosophy.
This essay disputes one of the central claims in Jeremy Waldron?s God, Locke, and Equality (2002), that being the claim that Locke?s arguments about species in An Essay Concerning Human Understanding undercut his assertions about the equality of the human species as a matter of natural law in Two Treatises of Government. It argues, firstly, and pace Waldron, that Locke?s view of natural law is foundational to his view of man, not vice versa, and, secondly, that Two Treatises is written (...) in an idiom different from Locke?s philosophical writings, such that directly transposing the ideas discussed in one idiom to the other is as confused as it is confusing. After providing a new account of the relationship between Locke?s philosophy and his views of morality, politics and religion, the essay concludes that Waldron fails to grasp the style and structure of Locke?s thinking, and so cumulatively misunderstands and distorts Locke?s views about moral identity, toleration, religion and politics alike. (shrink)
In the following paper I attempt to show how in Locke''s liberalthought the individual is subject to a complex operation involvingliberation and subjugation. In A Letter on Toleration (1685),Locke argues that the individual''s inward beliefs should be freed fromthe coercion of Church and State. To ensure liberty of conscience, theindividual''s soul should be constituted in practice – notstructured by violence but negotiated by rational persuasion. However,as I suggest, the authority of reason is not established without anelement of violence. In (...) his writings on education, Locke maintains thatthe right to care for one''s soul should be enjoyed only after rigorousmoral training. Thus, the individual''s conscience is to be freed fromoutward violence of ecclesiastic and civil powers only after first, inyouth, being subject to the moral discipline of esteem, disgrace, andshame, the inward violence of which discloses limits in Locke''sdiscourse on toleration. (shrink)
Generally we think it good to tolerate and to accord recognition. Yet both are complex phenomena and our teaching must acknowledge and cope with that complexity. We tolerate only what we object to, so our message to students cannot be simply, 'promote the good and prevent the bad'. Much advocacy of toleration is not what it pretends to be. Nor is it entirely clear what sort of conduct should count as intolerant. Sometimes people are at fault for tolerating what (...) they should not, or for tolerating what they should find unexceptionable. So virtue does not always lie with toleration. Tolerance can also seem condescending; should we therefore replace it with recognition? But recognition may not be able to coexist with the disapproval that makes toleration necessary. However, not everything about toleration and recognition is controversial; there are fixed points from which students can grapple with the issues presented by both. (shrink)
In this paper I comment on a recent “letter” by Burleigh Wilkins addressed to nascent egalitarian democracies which offers advice on the achievement of religious toleration. I argue that while Wilkins’ advice is sound as far as it goes, it is nevertheless underdeveloped insofar as his letter fails to distinguish two competing conceptions of toleration – liberal-pluralist and republican-secularist – both of which are consistent with the advice he offers, but each of which yields very different policy recommendations (...) (as can be seen by consideration of The United States v. Lee in America and, I’affaire du foulard in France). I argue that a democratic society of equals must be committed to liberal-pluralist rather than republican-secularist toleration. (shrink)
This paper examines and criticizes the defence of toleration due to John Rawls in Political Liberalism, and similar strategies mobilized in defence of toleration. It argues that the notion of the burdens of judgement, used by Rawls to defend his doctrine of reasonable pluralism, faces incoherence: schematically, either disagreement succumbs to reason, or vice versa. On similar grounds, reasonable disagreement defences of neutrality fail because of a double-mindedness about the relation between private judgements and public reason. This problem (...) arises, it is argued, from an attempt to make private judgements determinative in the formation of political and legal outcomes, even while subjecting the latter?s justification to norms of public reason. Deference to private judgements in political justification tends to countenance sedition, and this applies also to modern liberal attempts such as Rawls?s to ground toleration in private judgements. (shrink)
Two normative principles of toleration are offered, one individual-regarding, the other group-regarding. The first is John Stuart Mill’s harm principle; the other is “Principle T,” meant to be the harm principle writ large. It is argued that the state should tolerate autonomous sacrifices of autonomy, including instances where an individual rationally chooses to be enslaved, lobotomized, or killed. Consistent with that, it is argued that the state should tolerate internal restrictions within minority groups even where these prevent autonomy promotion (...) of members of the group. Finally, it is argued that toleration excludes external protections of minority groups. (shrink)
Recognition and toleration are ways of relating to the diversity characteristic of multicultural societies. The article concerns the possible meanings of toleration and recognition, and the conflict that is often claimed to exist between these two approaches to diversity. Different forms or interpretations of recognition and toleration are considered, confusing and problematic uses of the terms are noted, and the compatibility of toleration and recognition is discussed. The article argues that there is a range of legitimate (...) and importantly different conceptions of both toleration and recognition that are often not clearly distinguished, and that compatibility varies across this range and depending on what one considers the conceptions in relation to. (shrink)
Issues of religious toleration might be thought dead and advocacy of religious toleration a pointless exercise in preaching to the converted, at least in most contemporary European societies. This paper challenges that view. It does so principally by focusing on issues of religious accommodation as these arise in contemporary multi-faith societies. Drawing on the cases of exemption, Article 9 of the ECHR, and law governing indirect religious discrimination, it argues that issues and instances of accommodation are issues and (...) instances of toleration. Special attention is given to issues that arise when the claims of religious belief conflict with those of other legally protected characteristics, especially sexual orientation. The paper uses a concept of toleration appropriate to a liberal democratic political order—one that replaces the ‘vertical’ ruler-to-subject model of toleration that suited early modern monarchies with a ‘horizontal’ citizen-to-citizen model appropriate to a political order that aims to uphold an ideal of toleration rather than itself extend toleration to those whose lives it regulates. (shrink)
One of the most important issues today is the conflict between identity groups. Can the concept of toleration provide resources for thinking about this? The standard definition of toleration – rejection or disapproval of a practice or belief followed by a constraint of oneself from repressing it –has limits. If we seek to make political and social conditions of toleration among diverse people a stable reality, we need to flesh out more deeply and widely what that depends (...) upon. The essence to which it has been reduced was not toleration’s original impulse. In the sixteenth century, the objective was to create conditions of peaceful collective life among diverse groups of believers. I examine one strand of change in moral valuation underpinning political toleration: ideas about the body, time and the self as explored by Michel de Montaigne. We can extract from this analysis a way to think about grounding toleration today: a recognition of the value of particular, embodied selves. (shrink)
John Locke's theory of toleration has been criticized as having little relevance for politics today because it rests on controversial theological foundations. Although there have been some recent attempts to develop secular; or publicly accessible, arguments out of Locke's writings, these tend to obscure and distort the religious arguments that Locke used to defend toleration. More importantly, these efforts ignore the role that religious arguments may play in supporting the development of a normative consensus on the legitimacy of (...) liberal political principles. Bracketing the search for publicly accessible justifications makes it possible to appreciate the continued relevance of Locke's religious arguments for toleration. (shrink)
With the publication of Locke?s early manuscripts on toleration and the drafts for the Essay, it is possible to understand to what extent Locke?s ideas on religious toleration have developed. Although the important arguments for toleration can already be found in these early texts, Locke was confronted with a problem in his defence of toleration that he needed to solve. If faith, as a form of judgement, is involuntary, as Locke claims, how can one be held (...) accountable for the faith one has? In answer to this question reason comes to play a more prominent role in Locke?s notion of faith and in his defence of religious toleration, and in his philosophy in general. This notion of reason is not the reason we use for mathematical demonstrations. It is rather reason as we use it in discussion, and is thus fallible. It is precisely this kind of reason that played a central role in the Remonstrant religion to which Locke was closely connected at the time he developed a new argument for religious toleration when he was in the Netherlands. (shrink)
This paper argues that from an ethical point of view tolerance, which is simply one of a number of possible responses to ethical pluralism, is not an acceptable ideal. It fails to acknowledge and appreciate the good in other forms of life and thereby does not adequately respect the people who live these lives. Toleration limits the range of goods we might appreciate in our own lives and in the lives of those we care most about, and it tends (...) to lead to a number of deformations or personal failures of character. In place of tolerance, we should embrace ethical promiscuity—a view that not only acknowledges ethical pluralism but also offers good reasons to celebrate this state of affairs. (shrink)
The paper explores challenges for the interpretation of the ideal toleration that arise in educational contexts involving children. It offers an account of how a respect-based conception of toleration can help to resolve controversies about the accommodation and response to diversity that arise in schools.
Abstract A growing number of theorists have argued that toleration, at least in its traditional sense, is no longer applicable to liberal democratic political arrangements—especially if these political arrangements are conceived of as neutral. Peter Jones has tried make sense of political toleration while staying true to its more traditional (disapproval yet non-prevention) meaning. In this article, while I am sympathetic to his motivation, I argue that Jones’ attempt to make sense of political toleration is not successful. (...) Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-6 DOI 10.1007/s11158-012-9177-3 Authors Peter Balint, The University of New South Wales, Canberra, ACT 2602, Australia Journal Res Publica Online ISSN 1572-8692 Print ISSN 1356-4765. (shrink)
For many liberal democrats toleration has become a sort of pet-concept, to which appeal is made in the face of a myriad issues related to the treatment of minorities. Against the inflationary use of toleration, whether understood positively as recognition or negatively as forbearance, I argue that toleration may not provide the conceptual and normative tools to understand and address the claims for accommodation raised by at least one kind of significant minority: democratic dissenting minorities. These are (...) individuals, or aggregates of them, who oppose, on principled grounds, the outcomes of the majoritarian decision-making process. I argue that democratic dissenting minorities' claims are better understood as calls for respect for a person's capacity for self-legislation. I view respect as the cornerstone of justice in a liberal democracy: all norms resulting in a constraint on a person's conduct should be appropriately justified to her. I argue that the reconciliation of democratic dissenting minorities' claims requires an enhancement of the justificatory strategies of democratic decisions by enhancing in turn citizens' rights to political participation. This should be done both during decision making and after a provision is enacted by also securing space for contestation through such forms of illegal protest as civil disobedience and conscientious objection. (shrink)
In this paper I uncover the identities of the interlocutors of Pierre Bayle's Entretiens de Maxime et de Themiste, and I show the significance of these identities for a proper understanding of the Entretiens and of Bayle's thought more generally. Maxime and Themiste represent the philosophers of late antiquity, Maximus of Tyre and Themistius. Bayle brought these philosophers into dialogue in order to suggest that the problem of evil, though insoluble by means of speculative reason, could be dissolved and thus (...) avoided through mutual toleration. I conclude by comparing Bayle's "theodicy of toleration" with Kant's notion of authentic theodicy. (shrink)
Democratic politicians face pressures unknown to the prerogative rulers of the early modern period when toleration was first formulated as a political ideal. These pressures are less often expressed as demands by groups or individuals for the permission of practices they dislike than for their restraint or outright prohibition; tolerant dispositions are less politically clamorous. The executive structure of toleration as a virtue, together with the ‘fact of reasonable pluralism’, make conflicts over toleration peculiarly intractable. Political conflicts (...) are apt to take the form of mutual allegations ofintolerance; indeed, the problem of ‘tolerating the intolerant’, far from being a marginal case, is central to the theory and practice of toleration. Toleration thus exemplifies a category mistake committed in much contemporary political theory, particularly in its contractualist versions: the threshold of the political lies precisely where rational agreement proves impossible. The main prospects for democratic toleration are thus pre-emptive. The main way in which this can happen is by cultivating executive dispositions: in other words, encouraging people to detach themselves from strong evaluative commitments, so that toleration does not become politically contentious to start with. But this involves losses as well as gains. The gains in civil harmony and peace are obvious. The cost for tolerant political actors is alienation from what they have good reason to value. (shrink)
The Protestant conception of religion as a private matter of conscience organized into voluntary associations informed early liberalism's conception of religion and of religious toleration, assumptions that are still present in contemporary liberalism. In many other religions, however, including Hinduism (the main though not only focus of this article), practice has a much larger role than conscience. Hinduism is not a voluntary association, and the structure of its practices, some of which are inegalitarian, makes exit very difficult. This makes (...) liberal religious toleration an awkward fit for Hinduism; granting religious toleration in India undermines equality and autonomy in severe ways. Yet Hinduism is not without its virtues, and has historically been what I call externally tolerant-it has been relatively tolerant of other religions. Liberal toleration, by contrast, is internally tolerant-it is tolerant of religions that fit the Protestant model, while its tolerance of others is considerably more qualified. I briefly speculate at the end of the article about how to combine these two models of toleration. (shrink)
Toleration and neutrality are not always distinguished. When they are, they are often offered as two complementary solutions for the problem of achieving political unity and a degree of mutual acceptance within a pluralist liberal polity. The essay shows the concepts to be fundamentally distinct, and then argues that instead of being mutually supporting, they are mutually exclusive. Neutralist liberals, it is argued, must give up toleration in favour of the virtue of neutrality on the part of citizens.
The recognition of conflict puts an end to the idea that cosmopolitanism may be legitimized by a comprehensive doctrine. The article argues that within the limits of a post-secular society, toleration must be conceived as a principle of justice, based on regard for the law, within a society in which not only others’ rights but also other cultures must be respected.
As the product of liberalism's first encounter with the theoretical problems posed by legal discrimination and unequal treatment of minority groups, Locke's argument for religious toleration foreshadowed contemporary democratic theory's emphasis on non-coercive discussion of diverse rights claims and broadly inclusive public deliberations. This study tries to illuminate the democratic dimension of Locke's toleration theory by focusing on his crucial account of the church as a voluntary association. Here Locke presented discursive possibilities for the articulation of diverse beliefs (...) and interests that he believed would not only benefit both society as a whole and the minority religious groups contained in it, but also weave principles of contestation and deliberation into the very fabric of the liberal polity. (shrink)
Abstract I re-present my account of how a liberal democratic society can be tolerant and do so in a way designed to meet Peter Balint’s objections. In particular, I explain how toleration can be approached from a third-party perspective, which is that of neither tolerator nor tolerated but of rule-makers providing for the toleration that the citizens of a society are to extend to one another. Constructing a regime of toleration should not be confused with engaging in (...)toleration. Negative appraisal and power remain ‘possibility conditions’ of toleration but they are not necessary features of either a regime of toleration or the sponsors of such a regime. Content Type Journal Article Pages 1-6 DOI 10.1007/s11158-012-9178-2 Authors Peter Jones, Emeritus Professor of Political Philosophy, School of Geography, Politics and Sociology, Newcastle University, Newcastle upon Tyne, NE1 7RU UK Journal Res Publica Online ISSN 1572-8692 Print ISSN 1356-4765. (shrink)
Classic theories of religious toleration from the 17th century regularly made exceptions for various categories of people such as Catholics and atheists who need not be tolerated. From a contemporary perspective these may be understood as blind spots because at least some of us would argue that these exceptions were not necessary. This essay explores the toleration theories of John Milton, Benedict de Spinoza, Denis Veiras, John Locke and Pierre Bayle in order to assess whether they actually called (...) for such exceptions and whether those exceptions were justifed or were in fact blind spots. It concludes with some reflections on what our own blind spots may be, and whether we can see around them. (shrink)
The removal of life-sustaining treatment often brings physicians into conflict with patients. Because of their moral beliefs physicians often respond slowly to the request of patients or their families. People in bioethics have been quick to recommend that in cases of conflict the physician should simply sign off the case and "step aside". This is not easily done psychologically or morally. Such a resolution also masks a number of more subtle, quite trouble some problems that conflict with the commitment to (...)toleration and moral diversity that it is intended to support. These conflicts are detailed and evaluated. Keywords: collisions, conscientious objection, limits to toleration, moral diversity, patient, physician, toleration CiteULike Connotea Del.icio.us What's this? (shrink)
Multicultural societies are far more likely than others to include minorities committed to the pursuit of practices that offend the majority, and treating the cultural commitments of all citizens fairly will require some set of guiding principles to distinguish tolerable ‘cultural controversies’ from intolerable ones. This paper does not directly address the moral question at stake here (i.e. demarcating the limits of toleration) but rather seeks to provide a politically justifiable normative argument to explain when tolerant restraint is necessary, (...) permissible or prohibited. This argument emerges from a concern to treat the cultural commitments of all citizens fairly. In turn, the argument indicates a potential reconciliation of the ‘politics of toleration’ with the ‘politics of respect’. (shrink)
This essay discusses one source of toleration: a modest recognition of the limits of our ability to imagine the situation of the other. It further connects this with both respect for the autonomy of the other and the moral need to engage the other in dialogue. The conclusion is that toleration is important in light of the ubiquity of failures of the moral imagination. It considers several examples of the failure of the moral imagination, including a discussion of (...) the Hindu practice of sati or widow burning. (shrink)
Abstract By viewing toleration?which is usually interpreted as a personal attitude?through the lens of peaceful coexistence, Michael Walzer links toleration to political arrangements. The consequence of this approach is to blur basic political categories such as the state, political power, culture, and political creed. Moreover, while Walzer clearly prefers an immigrant society as embodying the practice of toleration more fully than any other regime, he fails to identify either its cultural or its political preconditions.
While most Christians have come to accept that there should be no attempt on the part of the state to coerce strict matters of conscience, many actively support the state coercively interfering with certain modes of conduct that violate God’s moral law. The development of this stance occurred during the seventeenth century English toleration debates. Then, tolerationists argued that there should be toleration for dissenting Protestant denominations, and eventually for Catholics, heretics, and atheists, too. But very few strict (...) biblical Christians, even today, endorse extending legal toleration, for example, to homosexual conduct or same-sex marriage. Two strategies, attributable to Locke, fail to support this asymmetry between religious error and the characteristic types of ‘Christian immorality’. I draw on arguments from the toleration debates to show that the boundaries of legal toleration should be extended to include these violations of divine moral law, and that strict biblical Christians should agree. (shrink)
Toleration and respect are often thought of as compatible, and indeed complementary, liberal democratic ideals. However, it has sometimes been said that toleration is disrespectful, because it necessarily involves a negative evaluation of the object of toleration. This article shows how toleration and respect are compatible as long as ‘respect’ is taken to mean (what some moral philosophers have called) recognition respect, as opposed to appraisal respect. But it also argues that recognition respect itself rules out (...) certain kinds of evaluation of persons, and with these, certain bases for toleration: if recognition respect is really distinct from appraisal respect, and if the fundamental rights assigned to people on the basis of recognition respect are to be equal rights, then recognition respect must itself involve a refusal to evaluate certain basic agential capacities of persons when deliberating about how to treat them. Even where ‘respect’ means recognition respect, then, there is some truth both in the thesis that toleration and respect are compatible, and in the thesis that they are incompatible. The different truths in these two theses help to shed light on the nature of toleration considered specifically as a liberal democratic virtue. This point can be illustrated by showing how the foregoing analysis provides a plausible solution to the so-called ‘paradox of the tolerant racist’. (shrink)
This article challenges two dominant views of religious and cultural toleration, namely, that it is modern and that it is Western. It claims instead that both medieval Latin thought and many non-Western traditions embraced a position that coherently defends tolerance beliefs and practices. Specifically, the article identifies four approaches that clearly favour toleration: scepticism, functionalism, nationalism and mysticism.
This paper takes the form of aletter to fledgling democracies such asAlgeria, Turkey, and Iran. It explores thenature of democracy and argues that theequality of citizens requires that differentreligions be treated equally. It presents some``lessons'''' from United States constitutionalhistory which might be useful to fledglingdemocracies as they seek to achieve aseparation of church and state. Developing atheme first presented in ``A Third Principle ofJustice,'''' The Journal of Ethics 1 (1997),pp. 355–374, it argues that religious tolerationsometimes may require a heightened sensitivityto (...) the needs of some religious associations. Itconcludes, however, that religious tolerationdoes not require a toleration of intolerantreligious extremists who pose a threat todemocracy. (shrink)
As one might expect, throughout his life Leibniz assumed an attitude of religious toleration both ad intra (that is, toward Christians of other confessions) and ad extra (that is, toward non-Christians, notably Muslims). The aim of this paper is to uncover the philosophical and theological foundations of Leibniz’s views on this subject. Focusing in particular on his epistolary exchange with the French Catholic convert Paul Pellisson-Fontanier, I argue that neither toleration ad intra nor toleration ad extra is (...) grounded for Leibniz in indifference toward the content of revealed religion. On the contrary, Leibniz remained convinced of the objective truth of the Christian religion as it is handed down by the millennia-old tradition of the truly universal church. In his view, reasons internal to the very nature of salvation and to the conception of God and man explicitly contained in or, at least, in accord with this tradition present religious toleration as the only justifiable answer to the differences among religions. (shrink)
In recent years, a number of prominent thinkers have argued that democratic arrangements tend to favour the flourishing of toleration among groups with radically different comprehensive worldviews. This article examines one of the most insightful arguments, advanced by Sheldon Leader, for grounding the practice of toleration on the value of democracy. It shows that Leader's attempt to ground the practice of toleration on a common understanding of democracy faces a number of fundamental obstacles. Such obstacles could only (...) be overcome if both liberals and their opponents were to reach an agreement on the value of democracy and thereby converge in their support for toleration. It argues that, far from providing a common ground that liberals and their opponents can share, the so?called ?shareable understanding? of democracy appeals primarily to liberals. (shrink)
From now on I intend to put aside history and exegesis of texts to take up as philosophical questions some matters which arise from Bayle's argument for toleration . In fact I believe that the main conclusions I argue for in the remaining essays are substantially Bayle's, but I am not concerned to show that they are, and have not adopted them out of any loyalty to him. This third essay is an analysis of the reciprocity argument as a (...) type. I have already discussed Bayle's version, but other versions are possible, and it seems worthwhile to analyse their common structure and consider their limitations. The fourth essay is a discussion of the ethics of belief and inquiry. This topic was touched on in connection with Fr Terrill's views on invincible ignorance (see above, Essay I, sect. 3), and again in connection with Bayle's views on culpable error, prepossession, opinionatedness and temerity (see above, Essay II, sect. 4.2). In the Philosophical Commentary see Supplement, ch. 17, "What judgement should be made of those who will not enter into disputes". But since Bayle's time a good deal has been written on the subject, and a discussion independent of his seems worthwhile. I will therefore put the texts aside and enter upon a consideration of some of the questions they have raised. (shrink)
The religious intolerance that nowadays feeds a number of current conflicts leads us to rethink our modern conception of toleration, which emerged from the theological and philosophical debates accompanying or thrown up by the doctrinal controversies and politico-religious wars of the 16th and 17th centuries. It is defined by respect for distinct orders: that of conscience and that of the law, private and public, faith and reason. It bears the mark of religion and theology and relates to the idea (...) of human dignity which was given its ethical foundation in the 18th century by Kant’s doctrine of autonomy. Current events teach us that still today people kill and persecute in the name of faith, in the name of God, in the name of religion, because they have a different opinion or belief. If toleration, child of the Enlightenment and critical reason, has not definitively gained the upper hand in a rational, technical world, we need to ask whether it is not because we have neglected faith. To conclude from the distinction between reason and faith that they are antagonistic has not led to uprooting the human spirit’s intolerance. Might we have forgotten that peace is also the business of religion? What should we expect, what should we hope for from dialogue between religions? Could faith be the antidote to intolerance? (shrink)
Toleration and respect are types of relations between different agents. The standard analyses of toleration and respect are attitudinal; toleration and respect require subjects to have appropriate types of attitudes towards the objects of toleration or respect. The paper investigates whether states can sensibly be described as tolerant or respectful in ways theoretically relevantly similar to the standard analyses. This is a descriptive question about the applicability of concepts rather than a normative question about whether, when (...) and why states should be tolerant or respectful. The problem of institutional application is that institutions in general and the state in particular arguably cannot have attitudes of the required kind. This problem is distinct from, and broader than, well-known problems about whether political toleration is normatively legitimate. To make sense of political toleration or respect, the paper proposes that the analysis of institutional toleration and respect should not be solely agent-centred (as in attitudinal analyses) or patient-centred (as in explanations of the good of toleration or respect in terms of the effects of being tolerated or respected). The analysis should also include features about the relation itself. We can describe institutions as tolerant or respectful in a sense relevantly similar to the standard analyses if we focus on the public features of the relation between institutions and citizens or groups, without ascribing attitudes in the problematic sense. (shrink)
Abstract It is often taken for granted by educationalists that toleration is a good thing; indeed, it is often taken for granted that toleration is a value which should be promoted in schools. It is thought to be especially valuable in a multicultural society such as modern Britain. But is this so, and why? In this paper we show that the issue of whether toleration should be promoted as a virtue in schools is controversial and its value (...) needs careful consideration in the light of certain paradoxes. We conclude that while schools should, indeed, promote toleration, it is a necessary but insufficient part of what should be a wider programme of moral education. (shrink)
Edward Said writes that Orientalism is a Western style for dominating the East. Richard Rorty proposes that intellectuals should be modern liberals in their politics but postmodern ironists in their intellectual lives. Rebecca Catz argues that Fern?o Mendes Pinto's Peregrination, a sprawling account of travels in the East first published in 1614, is a ?plea for toleration?. How do these theories stand up when confronted with the text? Once as well known as Cervantes's Don Quixote, this text has been (...) undeservedly overlooked in the study of political ideas, and that is a loss because it might make Saidians, Rortians and toleration theorists rethink some of their ideas. It is wrong to take Mendes Pinto's criticisms of Asians as Orientalism, partly because Mendes Pinto is equally critical of the Portuguese and other Europeans. It is wrong to think that irony can provide a comfortable intellectual home, partly because Mendes Pinto's life and text provide examples of a much more subtle and nihilistic irony than Rorty imagines. And finally, it is wrong to think that Mendes Pinto's text is a ?plea for toleration? in any but the most attenuated sense. (shrink)
As a moral principle toleration is universal, but only in the sense that potentially it is addressed to every rational and moral agent. The question is whether this principle is appropriate in all situations and what are those moral agents who recognize its practical actuality for them? Toleration is not an absolute ethical principle, but one among others in the context of a particular moral system. It should be given a proper place in the hierarchy of principles. Understanding (...)toleration as the absolute or even overriding principle may lead in the face of obvious and directly threatening wrong to its use as an umbrella for adoptive or escapist behavior. The limits to toleration are given by basic and minimal ethical task to resist evil. The principle of active opposition to evil by all possible means is prior to the principle of toleration. (shrink)
Toleration classically denotes a relation between two agents that is characterised by three components: objection, power, and acceptance overriding the objection. Against recent claims that classical toleration is not applicable in liberal democracies and that toleration must therefore either be understood purely attitudinally or purely politically, we argue that the components of classical toleration are crucial elements of contemporary cases of minority accommodation. The concept of toleration is applicable to, and is an important element of (...) descriptions of such cases, provided that one views them as wholes, rather than as sets of isolated relations. We explain this by showing how certain cases of toleration are multi-dimensional and how the descriptive concept of toleration might be understood intersectionally. We exemplify this by drawing on case studies of mosque controversies in Germany and Denmark. Finally, we propose that intersectionality is not only relevant to the descriptive concept of toleration but also captures an important aspect of normative theories of toleration. We illustrate this by discussing ideals of respect-based toleration, which we also apply to the case studies. (shrink)
Complicity as toleration of wrong is deeply rooted in Western language and narratives. It is based on assumptions about the self, our relationship to the world and personal accountability that differ from the Common Law's and moral theology's standard doctrines. How we blame others for tolerating wrong depends upon the moral force of public discourse and upon the meaning of censure as exhortation. Censure as blame is usually retrospective, while censure as exhortation is forward-looking and stresses moral maturity and (...) flourishing. (shrink)
The article will argue that, despite Will Kymlicka’s claims to the contrary, the concept of ‘multicultural toleration’ implicitly entails an essentialist concept of groups, which amounts to holding a negative ‘permission’, power-loaded conception of toleration and not a positive liberal ‘respect’ conception. This seems contradictory to the general goal of Kymlicka’s multiculturalism. This article will then argue that multicultural toleration is not a satisfactory concept, neither from a conceptual point of view (it is incoherent) nor from a (...) practical point of view (it disregards important aspects of political life). Nonetheless, multiculturalism poses the question of toleration at the correct level of group relations. This article will try to sustain the double requirement of, on one hand, trying to place toleration in a collective frame and, on the other, refusing the essentialist concept of groups used by multiculturalism. The way out of this difficulty can be found in a critical ‘non-domination’ conception of toleration. (shrink)
Societies emerging from severe internal bloodshed along ethnic, racial or religious lines face significant problems of reconciliation. A particularly “deep” form of recognition between former victims and offenders is necessary to end enmity and achieve solidarity. Yet it appears that deep reconciliation is logically incoherent as it requires that forgiveness be asked and be given for acts that are inexcusable and unforgivable. I argue, however, that toleration, understood as moral attitudes and dispositions, helps us understand why deep reconciliation is (...) logically coherent. Dispelling the apparent paradox lies in understanding the role of toleration in forming what I call relationships of “acknowledgment and forbearance.” Relationships of acknowledgement and forbearance overcome elements of enmity and estrangement, and such relationships are necessary, in turn, for deep reconciliation. (shrink)
The central thesis of Spinoza’s Theological-Political Treatise is that the state not only can permit freedom of philosophizing without endangering piety or the public peace, but that it must do so if it is not to destroy piety and the public peace. Spinoza’s argument is not limited to religious toleration, but is an argument for freedom of philosophizing generally. Nevertheless, freedom of philosophizing in religion is the central case. In making such an argument, he contributed greatly toward the transformation (...) of Western culture with respect to toleration and religious liberty. As an historian, I want to understand how this transformation came about and what role Spinoza played in it. As a philosopher, I also want to know whether any of the arguments philosophers made in favor of religious toleration deserved to be effective in bringing about this transformation. (shrink)
Are there independent standards of justice by which we are to measure our activities, or is justice itself to be understood in relativistic terms that vary with locality or historical period? I wish to examine briefly how far two inconsistent positions can both be accepted. I suggest that perhaps our ordinary understanding of reality itself—and in particular political reality—is essentially the outcome of a time of contest, and that there are areas of political reality where matters may be best seen (...) as still being contested. I thus question the need for a single internally consistent point of view, as if it alone were the answer to any particular political problem, and propose that a shared belief that reality is inconsistent may be a viable solution. Using the political scenario of Northern Ireland, I argue that justice requires the deliberate and institutionalised toleration of inconsistent views of the world. (shrink)
Theodicy and Toleration Seem at first glance to be an unlikely pair of topics to treat in a single paper. Toleration usually means putting up with beliefs or actions with which one disagrees, and it is practiced because the beliefs or actions in question are not disagreeable enough to justify interference. It is usually taken to be a topic for moral and political philosophy. Theodicy, on the other hand, is the attempt to solve the problem of evil; that (...) is, to explain the origin of suffering and sin in a way that does not make God a moral cause of those evils.1 While theodicy concerns the notions of good and evil, and could therefore be considered a moral topic, historical and contemporary discussions of it have .. (shrink)
It is virtuous for individual and collective agents to be tolerant. However, toleration is difficult, both in practice and in conceptualization. Firstly, given that toleration can be understood in various ways (Walzer 1997, Forst 2007), it seems that to determine what is the proper conception of toleration would be controversially difficult. Here I shall suggest one particular conception of toleration is more suitable than others. This conception allows, as I shall explain, us to better understandthe difficulties (...) of toleration. Thus, this particular conception of toleration should lead us to see what is more adequate for dealing with the difficulties of toleration. To be more precise, I shall argue for a political conception of toleration, which different from the attitudinal conception of toleration as being indifferent, or the ethical conception of toleration as respect. There is the suggestion of toleration as recognition (Galeotti 2002). These alternative understandings of toleration do not provide better diagnoses of the difficulties of toleration. The political conception of toleration is intended to be grounded on some moral considerations, notpragmatic purpose. It is political in that it recognizes the fact that toleration is essentially practiced to deal with a power relationship among the parties of toleration. Where these is no such power relationship, as I shall argue, there is no issue of toleration. Secondly, this proposed conception of toleration is political in the sense that it shall not deal with differences coming from, to use John Rawls’s phrase, the fact of pluralism by adopting any comprehensive doctrine such as an ethics of respect or recognition. (shrink)
The problems of diversity and pluralism have always been serious challenges to the stability of European societies. In the course of its history Europe elaborated various important ways of accommodation of differences, including toleration, respect and recognition. This article is devoted to discussion of the relations among them both in analytical and historical perspectives. I argue that toleration has always been based on a certain kind of respect and distinguish three main paradigms of the relations among these concepts. (...) Then I proceed to a discussion of the particular forms these paradigms took in European intellectual history and to an analysis of their applicability to the most important problems of contemporary society. I argue that pluralism and the complexity of contemporary society require pluralism in the modes of justifying toleration. (shrink)
This paper argues that the direct, vertical toleration of certain types of citizen by the Rawlsian liberal state is appropriate and required in circumstances in which these types of citizen pose a threat to the stability of the state. By countering the claim that vertical toleration is redundant given a commitment to the Rawlsian version of the liberal democratic ideal, and by articulating a version of that ideal that shows this claim to be false, the paper reaffirms the (...) centrality of vertical toleration in the Rawlsian liberal account of state-citizen relations. (shrink)
J. R. and Philip Milton present the first critical edition of John Locke's Essay concerning Toleration and a number of other writings on law and politics composed between 1667 and 1683. Although Locke never published any of these works himself they are of very great interest for students of his intellectual development because they are markedly different from the early works he wrote while at Oxford and show him working out ideas that were to appear in his mature political (...) writings, the Two Treatises of Government and the Epistola de Tolerantia. The Essay concerning Toleration was written in 1667, shortly after Locke had taken up residence in the household of his patron Lord Ashley, subsequently Earl of Shaftesbury. It has been in print since the nineteenth century, but this volume contains the first critical edition based on all the extant manuscripts; it also contains a detailed account of Locke's arguments and of the contemporary debates on comprehension and toleration. Also included are a number of shorter writings on church and state, including a short set of queries on Scottish church government (1668), Locke's notes on Samuel Parker (1669), and 'Excommunication' (1674). The other two main works contained in this volume are rather different in character . One is a short tract on jury selection which was written at the time of Shaftesbury's imprisonment in 1681. The other is 'A Letter from a Person of Quality', a political pamphlet written by or for Shaftesbury in 1675 as part of his campaign against the Earl of Danby. This was published anonymously and is of disputed authorship; it was first attributed to Locke in 1720 and since then has occupied an uncertain position in the Locke canon. This volume contains the first critical edition based on contemporary printed editions and manuscripts and it includes a detailed account of the Letter's composition, authorship, and subsequent history. This volume will be an invaluable resource for all historians of early modern philosophy, of legal, political, and religious thought, and of 17th century Britain. (shrink)
The advent of moral pluralism in the post-modern age leads to a set of issues about how pluralistic societies can function. The questions of biomedical ethics frequently highlight the larger issues of moral pluralism and social cooperation. Reflection on these issues has focused on the decision making roles of the health care professionals, the patient, and the patient's family. One species of actor that has been neglected has been those institutions which are part of the public, secular realm and which (...) have a particular moral heritage. Keywords: approval, compromise, condemnation, integrity, toleration CiteULike Connotea Del.icio.us What's this? (shrink)
In this paper I argue that equal respect-based accounts of the normative basis of tolerance are self-defeating, insofar as they are unable to specify the limits of tolerance in a way that is consistent with their own commitment to the equal treatment of all conceptions of the good. I show how this argument is a variant of the longstanding ‘conflict of freedoms’ objection to Kantian-inspired, freedom-based accounts of the justification of systems of norms. I criticize Thomas Scanlon’s defence of ‘pure (...) tolerance’, Anna Elisabetta Galeotti’s work on the relationship between tolerance, equal respect and recognition, and Arthur Ripstein’s recent response to the ‘conflict of freedoms’ objection. The upshot of my argument is that, while valuing tolerance for its own sake may be an appealing ideal, it is not a feasible way of grounding a system of norms. I close with a thumbnail sketch of two alternative, instrumental (i.e. non- Kantian) approaches to the normative foundations of tolerance. (shrink)
Patrick Greenough has argued that a predicate is vague iff it is epistemically tolerant. I show that there are some counterexamples to this analysis, and that it rests on some fairly contentious theories about the behaviour of vague terms in propositional attitude reports.
Values -- Tolerance -- Tolerant people -- Being tolerant of family -- Being tolerant of friends -- Being tolerant of neighbours -- Ways to be tolerant -- Being aware of others -- Respecting different kinds of families -- Accepting other cultures -- Including others -- Learning from others -- Being patient -- Personal set of values.
Examines the meaning of tolerance, its importance in modern society, and the kinds of intolerance or prejudice that may prevent people from respecting ...
Generally speaking, just war theory (JWT) holds that there are two just causes for war: self-defence and ‘other-defence’. The most common type of the latter is popularly known as ‘humanitarian intervention’. There is debate, however, as to whether these can serve as just causes for preventive war. Those who subscribe to JWT tend to be unified in treating so-called preventive war with a high degree of suspicion on the grounds that it fails to satisfy conventional criteria for jus ad bello; (...) – particularly the just cause and last resort criteria. Francisco di Vitoria held that the only just cause for war was ‘a wrong received’, which renders impossible any justification for preventive war. There are assumptions implicit in recent military practice, however – most notably, the US-led invasion of Iraq in 2003 – that challenge this ban on preventive war. Interestingly, both supporters and critics attempt to justify their views through the broader logic of JWT; viz., through a conception of what is good for both political communities and individuals, and through a legitimate defence of these goods. Supporters point to situations where so-called rogue states represent ‘grave and imminent risk’ of committing acts of aggression as grounds that justify preventive war; critics argue that to attack another political community on the basis of crimes not yet committed is a breach of the very rights JWT was created to defend. The advocate of preventive war does not appreciate important aspects concerning the morality of war. In the ongoing tension between Iran and The United States and her allies – if the rhetoric is to be believed – I am asked to tolerate a threat to my security and liberty, and to risk suffering aggression in defence of the rights of the antagonistic, but not yet aggressive, state. The crucial question is how such tolerance and risk fit in with the logic of just war: at what point, if any, does the risk of being attacked become great enough to justify declaring war in anticipation? In this paper I highlight some of the theoretical and practical difficulties in determining what counts as a grave and imminent threat, focusing especially on the complicated case of ‘imminence’ in the face of so-called ‘Weapons of Mass Destruction’. Secondly, I will argue that not only is the notion of preventive war inconsistent with the defence of the rights of political communities that JWT requires; it is also forbidden by the proportionality requirement of jus ad bellum. A risk of being subjected to aggression is the price for global peace. Whilst political communities can do much to prevent aggression and prepare themselves in case it occurs, the conditions for just war require that this prevention and preparation stop short of declaring war. We must live with a certain degree of risk in this area. (shrink)
While tolerance is acclaimed almost unanimously as an indispensable value in pluralistic and democratic societies, the meaning of this virtue is in fact far from obvious. There are good reasons to believe that the inflationary expectations addressed to it tend to cover up its specific difficulty. The A. therefore offers a conceptual analysis of the conditions of tolerance, placing particular emphasis on the conflict of reasons internal to the tolerating person, and pointing to the reflective structure of practical reason. In (...) this formal characterization, tolerance appears as a kind of permission grounded in the principle of exclusion of certain reasons for acting. If indeed tolerance presupposes such a complex balance of reasons, its moral value can never be taken for granted since it depends entirely on the quality of the reasons on the balance sheet. (shrink)
In this paper I explain the principle of tolerance in a double aspect, reference to truth and to the individual. Tolerance is diferent from another similar concepts and we analyze some socials paradoxes that the tolerance brings. In the base of tolerance is respect to the truth and to the individual. For that reason, the studyof the concept of respect as the fundament of tolerance is the sustain in which the real solidarity an peace are establish.
Machine generated contents note: 1. -- War on war, by Lewis Thomas -- 2. -- Silent genocide, by Abdus Salam -- 3. -- Error: a stage of knowledge, by Paulo Freire -- 4. -- Doing without a revolution?, by Tahar Ben Jelloun -- 5. -- Stop torture, by Manfred Nowak -- 6. -- Truth, force and law, by Rabindranath Tagore -- 7. -- Violence is an insult to the human being, by Federico Mayor -- 8. -- Totalitarianism banishes politics, by (...) Vaclav Havel -- 9. -- No one will stop us. , by Desmond Tutu -- 10. -- Colonialism and the youth bomb, by Joseph Ki-Zerbo -- 11. -- The shedding of blood -- 12. -- Letter from Nagasaki, by Takashi Nagai -- 13. -- Down with exclusion!, by Herbert de Souza -- 14. -- The nower to sav 'no'. bv loan Martin-Brown -- 15. -- Inquiry into a taboo, by Ouassila Si Saber -- 16. -- The illusions of rationalism, by Ernesto Sabato -- 17. -- The 'poisonous weed', by Ba Jin -- 18. -- Humanity, an ongoing creation, by Ali Ahmad Said Esber (Adonis) -- 19. -- Image, writing and the vandal, by Alberto Moravia -- 20. -- The charms of calumny, by Andres Bello -- 21. -- On the threshold of eternity, by the Abbe Pierre -- 22. -- The control of force, by Karl Jaspers -- 23. -- The nature of force, by Simone Weil -- 24. -- The debt of justice, by Martin Luther King -- 25. -- Democracy and barbarism, by Sergei S. Averintsev -- 26. -- If all the animals should disappear, by Richard Fitter -- 27. -- Irony and compassion, by Octavio Paz -- 28. -- Against all hatred, by Aime Cesaire -- 29. -- Creating differences, by Daniel J. Boorstin -- 30. -- I dislike the word 'tolerance', by Mahatma Gandhi. (shrink)
Valuing -- Morality and reasonable partiality -- Doing and allowing -- The division of moral labour : egalitarian liberalism as moral pluralism -- Is the basic structure basic? -- Cosmopolitanism, justice, and institutions -- What is egalitarianism? -- Choice, circumstance, and the value of equality -- Is terrorism morally distinctive? -- Immigration and the significance of culture -- The normativity of tradition -- The good of toleration.
