The following is an edited version of remarks Professor Habermas delivered to a seminar at Stanford University on January 25, 1995. The editors include the address in the Symposium because it illuminates philosophical aspects of interminority group conflict and the relationship of minority cultures and political identities to the majority culture within a constitutional democracy. My article, n1 which provides the basis for our discussion, is a response to my friend Charles Taylor's The Politics of Recognition. There are many aspects to multiculturalism, but the present debate focuses narrowly on normative questions of political and legal theory. The liberal and communitarian side interpret differently the principles of equal respect for and equal protection of everybody.
Liberalism is supposed to advocate a state which is blind to skin color and other differences.
It grants equal chances to everybody for the development of personal identities, independently of the kind of persons they are and their relation to collective identities. Communitarianism, of course, defends human rights too, but it concedes to the state, even requires of it, the commitment to intervene in processes of identity formation and maintenance, if necessary. Given this somewhat oversimplified contrast, the position I would like to defend is different from both positions. But even if collective rights were compatible with the individualistic design of modern legal orders based on subjective rights, it would not make any sense to employ them for cultural survival projects enforced by state power. The reproduction of traditions and cultural forms is an achievement which can be legally enabled, but by no means granted.