Moderate Secularism and Multicultural Equality

Abstract

Tariq Modood argues that European states are only ‘moderately secular’ and that this kind of secularism is compatible with public accommodation of religious groups and provides a model of Muslim integration appropriate for European states. Although attention to the fact of moderate secularism provides a response to a prominent argument against multicultural accommodation of religious minorities, what is really at stake in discussions of multiculturalism and secularism are political principles. Modood's case for accommodation of Muslims along the lines of moderate secularism presupposes a normative conception of equality, but his characterisation of multicultural equality is inadequate in several respects.

The Muhammad cartoons controversy in comparative perspective

“…However, there is also a second meaning of 'context', which is discussed and demonstrated with specific reference to the cartoons controversy by Laegaard in his contribution to this issue and also elsewhere (Laegaard 2008(Laegaard , 2009cf. Modood, 2009).…”

Multiculturalism, interculturalism, ‘multiculture’ and super-diversity: Of zombies, shadows and other ways of being

“…For many Muslims a religious identity has been central to this (Werbner, 2005(Werbner, , 2012, highlighting the significance of a politics of difference (Young, 1990). (It's interesting to note here that Modood's civic multiculturalism (2007Modood's civic multiculturalism ( , 2013 has also been criticized in part for being too based on empirical facts and not abstractly normative enough for political theory (see Laegaard, 2008Laegaard, , 2009Modood, 2009a).) Therefore, telling people who have fought for political recognition on particular grounds of religion or ethnicity, in a context that has discriminated and excluded them on those grounds, that these are without empirical reality and should therefore be abandoned or reduced seems to miss the point.…”

Revisiting Contextualism in Political Theory: Putting Principles into Context

“…We do so partly because this is an area with which we are familiar, but also because we hope to contribute to a lively ongoing debate about methodology in political theory which focuses specifically on multiculturalism (e.g. Carens 2000Carens , 2004Bader and Saharso 2004;Parekh 2005;Levy 2007;Laegaard 2008Laegaard , 2009Laegaard , 2015Modood 2009;Modood and Thompson 2015).…”