Why Adequate Secular Motivation Matters

Abstract

In his Religious Commitment and Secular Reason (2000), Robert Audi claims that citizens have a prima facie obligation to abstain from support of a public policy that restricts human conduct, unless they are sufficiently motivated in supporting it by adequate secular reasons. The paper argues that Audi fails to give a good justification of this claim. On the one hand, most parts of his justificaction are already covered by the more common claim that citizens should have adequate secular reasons if they support a public policy, thus leaving aside the condition concerned with motivation. On the other hand, there are certain cases where we should not restrict political engagement to secular motivation, because doing so would clearly undermine the goals of a secular political philosophy. Nevertheless, Audi’s claim is correct after all, but for a reason he does not mention himself. Therefore, the paper concludes that it is important to maintain this claim in a restricted version, as religious motivation might lead to non-neutral majority decisions.