Search Results

This chapter introduces the main problem of the book: the tensions that exist between cultural rights, and accommodation and formal protection for sexual equality in liberal constitutional democracies. It also discusses the unsatisfactory treatment of this problem within much recent mainstream political philosophy, especially liberal theories of multiculturalism and deliberative democracy theory.

This chapter explores the ways in which particular liberal notions of personal autonomy sit uneasily with certain cultural practices, especially those of ‘traditional’ or nonliberal groups. It argues that idealized, substantive ideals of autonomy can impede attempts to understand, evaluate, and where necessary, reform cultural traditions. The particular example that provides the focus for this chapter is that of the public debate on arranged and forced marriages among some (mostly Muslim) South Asians in Briton, a practice which has in recent years attracted the attention of British media, politicians, and the public. By examining the ways in which arranged and forced marriage have been framed in public debates in Britain, this discussion sheds light both on the limitations of the liberal autonomy paradigm — with its emphasis on choice and consent — and demonstrates the importance of engaging minority communities in the evaluation and reform of their own traditions.

Civic republicanism and procedural liberalism are–or should be–allies; exaggerating their differences is philosophically suspect and politically counterproductive. Liberals insist that whatever the object of public policy–whether it is legal rights, economic resources, political institutions, civic virtues, or communal identities–the aim of state policy should be to promote principles of right, not to promote particular conceptions of the good. However much Sandel describes republican freedom as an alternative to liberal justice, one may guess that he would not promote the former at the expense of the latter, and that he (tacitly) views principles of justice as setting constraints on the promotion of republican freedom. While right-wing liberalism has been influential, its influence has often been to rationalize nonliberal opposition to progressive policies, which it is able to do because it is right-wing (i.e. because it opposes redistribution), not because it is liberal (i.e. not because of its commitment to revisability and its rejection of perfectionism). If the traditional liberal commitment to national institutions as the site of collective self-government and distributive justice is no longer viable, then liberals will need to create new forums of self-government, new institutions of redistribution, and corresponding new forms of identity and virtues.

This chapter provides critical assessments of the new trends in democratic theory. It argues that any account of democracy grounded upon cultural identity rather than impartiality cannot present a satisfactory account of the containment and diffusion of political power which grounds the moral attractiveness of democracy in the modern global context. It shows that ‘culture’ and ‘identity’ are the concepts which prevent exponents of democracy from seeing the relevant similarities between the discredited communist version of democracy and the contemporary identity-based account of democracy. Moreover, it explores the claim that a ‘secure cultural context’ is a right necessary to protect and enhance the personal identity and sense of self-worth of cultural groups outside the dominant cultural context. Neutrality and universality, and the priority of individual rights, are strongly disputed. Group rights based upon cultural identity are an unsatisfactory foundation upon which to build an account of a ‘nonliberal’ democracy.