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Vulnerable and Dangerous: Epistemic and Institutional Aspects of the Right to Freedom of Religion

Citizenship
Religion
Liberalism
Political theory
Andrea Baumeister
University of Stirling
Andrea Baumeister
University of Stirling

Abstract

This Paper will argue that religion occupies a special position within liberal democracies and should indeed be viewed as simultaneously distinctly vulnerable and particularly dangerous to the liberal democratic constitutional state. To appreciate this position it is vital to clearly distinguish between the epistemic and institutional aspects of a right to freedom of religion. While the liberal commitment to freedom of conscience is well-placed to capture epistemic aspects of religious liberty, an appeal to freedom of conscience per se does not provide sufficient grounds to assign a special role to religious considerations. The special vulnerability of religion stems from the demands that liberty and equality as political values make upon citizens of a liberal democratic state. These burdens provide good reasons to view appeals by individuals for accommodation on the grounds of religious claims of conscience with particular care. However, whereas these burdens of citizenship highlight the potential vulnerability of individual religious believers, the claims to institutional sovereignty on the part of organised religion point to the dangers that religion poses to the autonomy of a liberal democratic political community committed to civic equality and the pursuit of public purposes. Indeed, the need to protect a democratic space for the pursuit of public purposes sets real limits to the extent to which the liberal democratic constitutional state can (and should) accede to demands for ‘institutional accommodation’ on the part of religious organisations. While religious organisations should be free to play a full role in civil society, the liberal state can legitimately insist that they do so in a manner that is consistent with the egalitarian and inclusive character of a liberal polity and its emphasis on non-discrimination and non-domination. To do so is to merely affirm the legitimate claims of citizenship in a liberal polity.