On Liberalism’s Religion

Abstract

ABSTRACTThis chapter addresses two crucial issues raised by Laborde’s superb Liberalism’s Religion. The first pertains to where the liberal democratic modern state draws the line between the self-governing prerogatives of religious nomos communities and their regulation by the civil law; the second pertains to the prerogative of the state to do the relevant line drawing. Theorists concerned with religious freedom focus on the first set of questions under the rubric of ‘accommodation.’ The issue is unfair discrimination. I focus on Laborde’s approach to the second. This is again an important issue due to the recent revival of jurisdictional political pluralism: an approach that challenges the supremacy of the civil law and of the authority of the sovereign state over domestic religious authorities. I suggest more work must be done to parry those challenges.