Author Archives: Marilyn Mason

Opinion: How liberal are liberals obliged to be?

By Marilyn Mason | Sun 17th February 2008 - 2:23 pm

The Archbishop of Canterbury’s suggestion last week that the state should give some kind of recognition to sharia law raised important questions for liberals.

We tend to believe that what the great philosopher of liberty John Stuart Mill called “experiments in living” should be permitted, as long as they do not harm others. And, surely, the independent conciliation and adjudication agencies (that the Archbishop appears to have meant) and free expressions of faith and diverse family arrangements are “experiments in living” – to be tolerated, even welcomed, as harmless gestures of respect to minority communities in our plural society?

But real …

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