Religion, démocratie libérale et espace public

This paper deals with the relation between Religion, Liberal Democracy and Public Space. In a first step, I quickly expound the Rawlsian concept of public use of reason. In the second the critiques of the Rawlsian concept not only by communitarians but also by those – even Liberals - who believe that religion or faith is an essential dimension of individual identity, of the citizen, of a free and democratic country. Finally I discussed four different positions held by jürgen Habermas, Jeffrey Stout, Paul Weithman and Charles Taylor. Against Habermas, I argued that the modernistic position defended which goes back to Weber is too strong and can only lead to consider belivers as second-class citizens or « culturally backward people ». I underline the value of Stout’s and Wethman’s hermeneutic arguments explaining why Rawls felt the need to develop the idea of public reason as a solution in the context of a pluralistic and conflictual society before presenting Charles Taylor’s position on secularism as the best solution to the question of democratic pluralism