Wednesday, April 02, 2008

Dialectics of Secularisation

"In an article on the "Dialectics of Secularisation," Jürgen Habermas makes a lengthy contribution to the debate launched by signandsight.com and Perlentaucher on Islam in Europe. Habermas sides with neither the 'secularists' nor the 'multiculturalists,' but he does approve of the secularists' "insisting energetically on the absolute essentialness of equal inclusion of all citizens in civil society. ... Religious citizens and religious communities should not only assimilate on the surface level. They must embrace the secular legitimation of the community within the premises of their own belief." But Habermas also demands that the secular side engages in a learning process. One of his arguments: "The democratic state (should) avoid rushing to reduce the polyphonic complexity of the spectrum of public voices because it cannot be certain that this might not sever society from the meagre resources that generate meaning and identity."

from here

orginal article here
also here

No comments:

 
Locations of visitors to this page