Islamic Law and the Canadian Mosaic: Politics, Jurisprudence, and Multicultural Accommodation

Multiculturalism meets privatisation: the case of faith-based arbitration

“…The option presented above does not exhaust the range of possibilities and, indeed, other commentators have offered creative proposals that resemble elements of my proposal and differ in other respects (Emon, 2012;Shachar, 2008). To the extent that I endorse bringing the secular, public legal order and the full range of private mechanisms amenable to the application of faithbased principlesarbitration, mediation and negotiationinto conversation with one another, my recommendation is broadly compatible with Ayelet Shachar's promotion of 'transformative accommodation' as a model for managing relations between the state and minority religious communities (Shachar, 2001).…”

No to Rawlsian Public Reason and Yes to the Enlarged Mentality: An Affirmative Role for Moral and Religious Arguments in Canadian Public Discourse in Light of Charter Values

“…The scholar, Joseph Raz, provides cogent commentary in relation to Rawls employment of political constructivism to arrive at his 'political conception of justice' as he styles it'. 9 Raz's commentary is particularly helpful as it pointedly addresses all four features of Rawls' political constructivist approach.…”

“…8 Raz argues that the fact that Rawlsian public reason reflects the consensus of our societies presents a problem for Rawls' thesis as by its reliance on the fact of consensus within the very societies it acts as principles of justice for, it is self-referential and citizens of such societies will live up to their own standards. 9 Raz submits that the idea that consensus is the only goal in nearly just societies is an external condition on Rawls' methodological conception and that this limits its applicability. 1 He argues that based on Rawls' rendition of the overlapping consensus it clearly is a consensus not among members of the society but it is primarily a consensus among the different conceptions of the good in society.…”

“…8 Raz argues that Rawls' thesis suggests that the people who are subject to public reason accept the principles of justice from the point of view of their own comprehensive conception of the good. 9 Raz suggests that for these people their political philosophy does not have any shallow foundations, they regard it as the application of their comprehensive morality to the special problem of politics. 1 Consequently Raz argues that contrary to Rawls suggestion, his theory cannot be strongly autonomous.…”

“…8 Sandel suggests that as a result the agreement secured in the original position can only be in the cognitive sense. 9 He asserts that this is because by the original position requiring all individuating circumstances of the deliberators to be excluded, it makes them not merely similarly situated but identically situated. 10 He argues that Rawls himself acknowledges that no two subjects could ever be regarded as identically situated and still count as distinguishable persons and that therefore Rawls contractarian conception can only be explained in the cognitive sense.…”