Feb 7, 2022 01:20 AM
(This post was last modified: Feb 7, 2022 01:48 AM by C C.)
https://www.liberalcurrents.com/defending-neutrality/
INTRO (Kevin Vallier): Liberals love to tell their creation story. It begins in the 17th century. Liberalism arose from the political competition between Catholics and Protestants in Western Europe. Pre-liberal and liberal philosophers fought to end religious wars, and they defended religious toleration as a moral principle. Prominent figures include Pierre Bayle, Roger Williams, Baruch Spinoza, and John Locke.
In truth, these figures’ views did not impact real institutions for a long time. Religious toleration arose from political necessity rather than political principle. But as time wore on, most nations came to see religious toleration as a matter of human rights.
Liberal neutrality, then, grew out of doctrines of religious neutrality. We at first said that states should not take sides on matters of faith. Or at least not matters of faith disputed within Western polities. Since the end of WWII, the right to religious freedom has received global recognition, and many democratic regimes have adopted and honored those protections even if they have established churches.
Some liberal philosophers and legal scholars now apply neutrality to non-religious doctrines. They discourage governments from taking sides in contentious religious and moral disputes. One might argue John Stuart Mill has a version of it as an implication of his harm principle. But liberal neutrality spread to the public owing to novel points of disagreement. Many such disputes flow from the sexual revolution. The list is long: contraception, abortion, women’s rights, interracial marriage, no-fault divorce, sex outside of marriage, pornography, LGBT relationships, and so on.
Liberals recommend neutrality to avoid resolving disputes that seem unresolvable. The alternative is for the state to use coercion to boost one side over the other. But this is a recipe for conflict and oppression, or so the liberal claims. Neutrality is a strategy for creating social peace in ways that respect human dignity.
Liberal neutrality despised
But today liberalism is taking a beating. The central liberal doctrine under assault is the ideal of liberal neutrality. We can now articulate it as the claim that the state should not use its coercive powers to advance values held by only part of the population. A neutral state, for instance, does not use coercion to favor one religion over others.
Why is this doctrine under attack? Many regard it as mere propaganda. Liberals use neutrality to rationalize their grip on power. Then they promote their sectarian ends at the expense of others. Liberals claim that liberal values like autonomy are neutral. But that’s only a liberal deception.
Sometimes anti-neutralists go further. Liberals are bad neutralists because no one can be neutral.
Here I see three objections.
In this essay, I define and defend liberal neutrality...
EXCERPT: . . . Liberal neutrality exists. I am told that my liberalism is a fairy tale. Anti-liberals grapple with really-existing liberalism, not the liberalism of the graduate seminar. Anti-liberals often claim unique insight into “liberalism” as a social force. Yet they seldom tell you what kind of thing liberalism is. Is liberalism a philosophy? No. Is it an ideology? They rarely use that term. Some anti-liberals call liberalism a “socio-political regime.” I know what a political regime is. But what is a social regime? It must be a collective of norms and ideals. But then, let’s distinguish between types of norms and ideals. Then we can develop a subtler analysis. So I struggle to understand liberalism’s new critics. I don’t know what sort of thing they oppose.
We cannot allow anti-liberals to portray themselves as hard-nosed realists. Their concrete proposals are often justifiable from many perspectives, whereas other ideas, like a Catholic monarchy, invite overwhelming opposition. When they propose a distinctive policy position, I’m all ears. And when they tell us what liberalism is, I’m ready to engage.
I respect the claim that the ideal of liberal neutrality is infeasible. But people maintained for centuries that allowing religious pluralism would destroy social unity, and they were wrong. We can extend neutrality beyond religion, even to political ideology itself, and people may one day treat ideological bigotry like religious bigotry. We have a great measure of religious neutrality and some moral neutrality. We can have more... (MORE - missing details details)
RELATED (scivillage): Teaching tolerance in schools cannot avoid controversy
INTRO (Kevin Vallier): Liberals love to tell their creation story. It begins in the 17th century. Liberalism arose from the political competition between Catholics and Protestants in Western Europe. Pre-liberal and liberal philosophers fought to end religious wars, and they defended religious toleration as a moral principle. Prominent figures include Pierre Bayle, Roger Williams, Baruch Spinoza, and John Locke.
In truth, these figures’ views did not impact real institutions for a long time. Religious toleration arose from political necessity rather than political principle. But as time wore on, most nations came to see religious toleration as a matter of human rights.
Liberal neutrality, then, grew out of doctrines of religious neutrality. We at first said that states should not take sides on matters of faith. Or at least not matters of faith disputed within Western polities. Since the end of WWII, the right to religious freedom has received global recognition, and many democratic regimes have adopted and honored those protections even if they have established churches.
Some liberal philosophers and legal scholars now apply neutrality to non-religious doctrines. They discourage governments from taking sides in contentious religious and moral disputes. One might argue John Stuart Mill has a version of it as an implication of his harm principle. But liberal neutrality spread to the public owing to novel points of disagreement. Many such disputes flow from the sexual revolution. The list is long: contraception, abortion, women’s rights, interracial marriage, no-fault divorce, sex outside of marriage, pornography, LGBT relationships, and so on.
Liberals recommend neutrality to avoid resolving disputes that seem unresolvable. The alternative is for the state to use coercion to boost one side over the other. But this is a recipe for conflict and oppression, or so the liberal claims. Neutrality is a strategy for creating social peace in ways that respect human dignity.
Liberal neutrality despised
But today liberalism is taking a beating. The central liberal doctrine under assault is the ideal of liberal neutrality. We can now articulate it as the claim that the state should not use its coercive powers to advance values held by only part of the population. A neutral state, for instance, does not use coercion to favor one religion over others.
Why is this doctrine under attack? Many regard it as mere propaganda. Liberals use neutrality to rationalize their grip on power. Then they promote their sectarian ends at the expense of others. Liberals claim that liberal values like autonomy are neutral. But that’s only a liberal deception.
Sometimes anti-neutralists go further. Liberals are bad neutralists because no one can be neutral.
Here I see three objections.
- Liberal neutrality is incoherent. The ideal entails a contradiction or is self-refuting. The slogan: “Nothing is neutral.”
- Liberal neutrality is infeasible. The idea of a neutral regime is coherent. But someone will rule and use political power to promote contestable objectives.
- Liberal neutrality is unattractive. The ideal is coherent and workable, but we shouldn’t be neutralists anyway. State power should promote correct values, no matter whether they’re neutral.
In this essay, I define and defend liberal neutrality...
EXCERPT: . . . Liberal neutrality exists. I am told that my liberalism is a fairy tale. Anti-liberals grapple with really-existing liberalism, not the liberalism of the graduate seminar. Anti-liberals often claim unique insight into “liberalism” as a social force. Yet they seldom tell you what kind of thing liberalism is. Is liberalism a philosophy? No. Is it an ideology? They rarely use that term. Some anti-liberals call liberalism a “socio-political regime.” I know what a political regime is. But what is a social regime? It must be a collective of norms and ideals. But then, let’s distinguish between types of norms and ideals. Then we can develop a subtler analysis. So I struggle to understand liberalism’s new critics. I don’t know what sort of thing they oppose.
We cannot allow anti-liberals to portray themselves as hard-nosed realists. Their concrete proposals are often justifiable from many perspectives, whereas other ideas, like a Catholic monarchy, invite overwhelming opposition. When they propose a distinctive policy position, I’m all ears. And when they tell us what liberalism is, I’m ready to engage.
I respect the claim that the ideal of liberal neutrality is infeasible. But people maintained for centuries that allowing religious pluralism would destroy social unity, and they were wrong. We can extend neutrality beyond religion, even to political ideology itself, and people may one day treat ideological bigotry like religious bigotry. We have a great measure of religious neutrality and some moral neutrality. We can have more... (MORE - missing details details)
RELATED (scivillage): Teaching tolerance in schools cannot avoid controversy