Tolerance or Recognition? What Can We Expect?

• Authors: Olli-Pekka Vainio , Aku Visala
• Languages of publication: EN

Abstracts

EN

The last two decades have seen the (re)emergence of the concept of recognition in ethical and political theory. Oftentimes, recognition is seen as a deeper, more developed version of tolerance, without the problems that tolerance purportedly has. We should not “merely” tolerate different individuals, identities and cultures, but recognize them, or so the argument goes. This move from tolerance to recognition is not without its critics. We will outline some of these criticisms and address them with the resources provided by the theory of recognition. We will suggest that while some of the criticisms are unfounded, the move from tolerance to recognition has a number of problems that the critics have correctly pointed out. The relationship between tolerance and recognition is complex: both have their own aims and functions. We will suggest that there are cases–especially ones that involve deep moral disagreements–where tolerance is a more reasonable aim than recognition.

Keywords

EN

tolerance; recognition; oppression; minorities; moral judgment; Charles Taylor; Axel Honneth

• Publisher: Sciendo
• Journal: Open Theology
• Year: 2016
• Volume: 2
• Issue: 1

Dates

received

2016-01-28

accepted

2016-04-11

online

2016-06-10

Contributors

author

Olli-Pekka Vainio

• University of Helsinki, Finland

author

Aku Visala

• University of Helsinki, Finland

Identifiers

DOI

10.1515/opth-2016-0044