Kenan Malik: «Free Speech in a plural society»

«What should be the limits of free speech in a plural society? It is a question that has been asked with increasing urgency over the past few years.

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Today, many liberals argue that whatever may appear to be right in principle, in practice one must appease religious and cultural sensibilities because such sensibilities are so deeply felt.

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Part of the problem with this whole debate is that both sides conflate two distinct notions of multiculturalism - multiculturalism as lived experience and multiculturalism as a political process. When most people say that multiculturalism is a good thing what they mean is the experience of living in a society that is less insular, less homogenous, more vibrant and cosmopolitan than before. In other words it's a case for cultural diversity, mass immigration, open borders and open minds.

Those who advocate multiculturalism as a political process are, however, talking about something different. Multiculturalism, they argue, requires the public recognition and affirmation of cultural differences. We live in a world, so the argument runs, in which there are deep-seated conflicts between cultures embodying different values, many of which are incommensurate but all of which are valid in their own context. Social justice requires not just that individuals are treated as political equals, but also that their cultural beliefs are treated as equally valid, and indeed are institutionalised in the public sphere.

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I believe it is critical to separate these two notions of multiculturalism. The irony of multiculturalism as a political process is that it undermines much of what is valuable about diversity as lived experience. When we talk about diversity, what we mean is that the world is a messy place, full of clashes and conflicts. That is all for the good, for such clashes and conflicts are the stuff of political and cultural engagement.

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Diversity is important, not in and of itself, but because it allows us to expand our horizons, to compare and contrast different values, beliefs and lifestyles, make judgements upon them, and decide which may be better and which may be worse.

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The right to 'subject each others' fundamental beliefs to criticism' is the bedrock of an open, diverse society. 'If liberty means anything', as George Orwell once put it, 'it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear'.

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Free speech does not mean accepting all views. It means having all views in the open so we can challenge the ones we find unconscionable.

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In its traditional Kantian sense, respect requires us to treat every human being equally as a moral, autonomous being. Every individual possesses the capacity to express political and moral views and to act upon them. And every individual is responsible for their views and actions and is capable of being judged by them. The importance of free speech is that it is an expression of individual moral autonomy, the capacity of people to engage in a robust debate about their beliefs and their actions - and to bear the consequences.

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(Kenan Malik, 10/2006.)