What Does ‘Respect for Difference’ Mean?

Abstract

Multiculturalism understood as a normative political stance towards the pluralist characteristic of culturally diverse societies is often, both in ordinary political parlance and at the level of theory, formulated as being about ‘respect’. In everyday political debate, the state, ‘society’ or particular actors are often called upon to ‘respect’ minorities or their different practices, beliefs or traditions, and this is often taken to require or involve the kind of policies characteristic of multiculturalism. Standard examples of such multiculturalist policies include exemptions from animal welfare legislation to allow kosher and halal butchering or from official dress codes to allow religious headdress such as Muslim headscarves or Sikh turbans, positive support for and recognition of minority religious organisations, official recognition of, for example, Muslim family law and possibly Muslim religious bodies as authoritative interpreters hereof, extension of hate-speech legislation to cover attacks on Muslims qua Muslims and more symbolic measures such as official statements about and consultations with minorities.