Will Kymlicka a formulé une théorie libérale du droit des minorités en arguant que l'on doit protéger les cultures minoritaires des influences extérieures, car, selon lui, ces cultures fournissent aux individus un contexte de choix significatif qui permet la prise de décision autonome. Il limite donc la portée de sa théorie aux minorités « culturelles », c'est-à-dire les minorités nationales et immigrantes, qui peuvent fournir ce contexte de choix significatif aux individus. Évidemment, les injustices vécues par ces deux types de minorités, aussi sévères soient-elles, n'épuisent pas les expériences d'injustices vécues par les membres de groupes minoritaires et minorisés (i.e. minorités sexuelles, femmes, Afro-Américains, etc.). On pourrait donc être tenté d'élargir la portée de la théorie du droit des minorités pour rendre compte de toutes les injustices vécues en tant que minorité. Toutefois, je défends la thèse selon laquelle cette extension est impossible dans le cadre d'une théorie libérale, car une de ses méthodes typiques, la « théorie idéale », limite la portée critique des thèses de Kymlicka et parce que l'autonomie individuelle a un caractère si fondamental pour les libéraux, qu'ils ne peuvent rendre compte du fait que certaines décisions individuelles autonomes peuvent contribuer à perpétuer des systèmes et des normes injustes. / Will Kymlicka defends a liberal theory of minority rights, arguing that we must protect minority cultures from outside influences, as these cultures provide individuals with a meaningful context of choice that allows autonomous decision-making. This defence of minority rights limits the scope of his theory by focusing on 'cultural' minorities, that is to say, national minorities and immigrants, which can provide individuals with this meaningful context of choice. Obviously, the injustices experienced by these two types of minorities, however severe they are, do not exhaust the injustices experienced by members of minority groups and minoritized groups (i.e. sexual minorities, women, African Americans, etc.). One might be tempted to expand the scope of the theory of minority rights to account for all the injustices experienced as a minority. However, I argue that this extension is not possible within a liberal theorical framework where 'ideal theory' limits the critical force of Kymlicka’s thesis and in which the centrality of individual autonomy prevents liberals to realize that certain individual decisions contribute to the perpetuation of unjust systems, values and norms.

May the state, from a liberal point of view, operate laws and institutions that impede the mobile lifestyle of nomadic Roma and Travellers, or should the state take steps to accommodate their nomadic way of life? This is the essence of the problem of Roma and Traveller itinerancy and the question that is at the heart of this three-partite dissertation. The first part of the dissertation looks at public policy in France and the United Kingdom and describes the six public policy problems that constitute the problem of Roma and Traveller itinerancy. These problems concern the education of children, the French travel permits system, the legal conditions for voter registration and for GP registration, the housing benefits system, and the public provision of halting sites. The second part looks at liberal political theory. It suggests that contemporary liberalism divides into two strands that take different views on the entitlements of cultural and religious minorities, and it provides a detailed outline of the prime articulations of each approach, namely the multiculturalist liberalism of Kymlicka and the classic neutrality liberalism of Barry. The third part investigates what the two said liberalisms imply for the six policy problems from part 1. These analyses suggest that the two liberalisms have slightly diverging implications for the halting sites problem, the housing benefits problem and the problem of GP registration. They suggest furthermore that the two accounts converge on the question of voter registration and agree that the voter registration system must accommodate nomads, and may not make the possession of a fixed residence an absolute condition for voter registration. And the analyses suggest finally that the two liberalisms also converge over the education question and the travel permits question, but here support polices that are potentially inimical to Roma and Traveller itinerancy. The broader implications of these findings are that liberalism is potentially, but not necessarily and not intrinsically, inimical to Roma and Traveller nomadism, and that the disagreement between classic neutrality liberalism and multiculturalist liberalism is weak insofar as public policy is concerned.

Les sociétés modernes sont de plus en plus souvent confrontées aux enjeux de la diversité. Le multiculturalisme tente d’y apporter une réponse à travers un modèle de société basé sur une politique de la reconnaissance. Selon moi, l’argumentation des multiculturalistes repose sur leur conception de l’identité. C’est pourquoi, pour apporter une critique nouvelle de ce courant de pensée, j’analyse les écrits de ses principaux défenseurs, Will Kymlicka et Charles Taylor, en concentrant mon analyse sur ce qu’ils entendent par identité. Je soutiens que leur conception ne laisse pas assez de place au potentiel d’évolution et ne considère pas suffisamment l’importance et le pouvoir de la volonté individuelle dans la construction de l’identité. En m’appuyant sur l’étude d’autres auteurs, je souligne la nécessité de considérer les frontières entre le semblable et l’autre de manière plus souple et de reconnaître que la violence peut s’exercer par la création de différences entre les personnes. J’ai choisi la figure radicale de « l’homme sans qualités » de Robert Musil pour montrer comment un individu peut devenir autonome à travers un acte de destruction créatrice. Enfin, je conclus que l’État devrait favoriser ce processus, et permettre au sujet, qui est selon moi dénué d’une nature authentique, de penser son existence comme une expérience du possible. / Modern societies are increasingly confronted with the challenge of diversity. Defenders of multiculturalism responded with a model of society based on a politics of recognition. This model can be connected to a particular conception of identity. In order to make a new contribution to the critique of this approach, this work presents an analysis of the writings of two of the main proponents: Will Kymlicka and Charles Taylor. It does so by focusing on their conception of identity and argues that it does not leave enough room for change and fails to fully recognise the importance and the impact of personal will. The works of other authors are analysed in order to emphasize the need to view the boundaries between sameness and otherness in a more flexible fashion and to acknowledge that violence can attend the creation of differences between people. The figure of the “man without qualifies” portrayed by the novelist Robert Musil is offered as emblematic of how an individual can become autonomous through an act of creative destruction. Finally, it is concluded that the state should facilitate the creation of difference and this requires allowing citizens to conceive of their lives as an experience of the possible.

Ce mémoire traite de la critique communautarienne du libéralisme et se donne deux projets. D’abord, il s’agit de formuler une position de synthèse à partir des travaux des philosophes Charles Taylor, Michael Sandel, Alasdair MacIntyre et Michael Walzer. Cette synthèse s’articule autour de trois axes, soit ontologique, sociale et méthodologique. Le deuxième projet est d’évaluer cette position pour statuer sur son rapport au libéralisme, et, plus précisément, pour déterminer si elle est seulement une critique, une alternative, ou encore une variante à l’intérieur du libéralisme. Il est conclu que le communautarisme est réconciliable avec une certaine forme de libéralisme et que sa critique permet même de l’améliorer. / In this essay about the communitarian critique of liberalism I seek to reach two goals. First, it is to form a synthesis from the works of philosophers Charles Taylor, Michael Sandel, Alasdair MacIntyre and Michael Walzer. This synthesis is articulated through three axes: ontologicial, social and methodological. Building on this, my second objective is to assess its relation to liberalism. More specifically, I seek to determine whether communitarianism is merely a critique, an alternative or a variant of liberalism. My conclusion is that communitarianism is reconciliable with a certain form of liberalism and that its critique allows to improve it.

À la base de ce travail se trouve la problématique de la place et du rôle de la religion dans l'espace public des sociétés occidentales contemporaines. Son but est de dégager des propositions qui permettront d'adapter le politique, c'est-à-dire les institutions publiques et le comportement des citoyens, à la pluralité des doctrines englobantes et des conceptions du bien qui caractérise le monde d'aujourd'hui. Et cela, tout en honorant l'ensemble des valeurs et des principes libéraux et démocratiques, à commencer par l'égalité fondamentale entre les personnes et la liberté de conscience et de religion. L'objectif général est donc de définir le sens et la forme de cette composante essentielle de toute démocratie libérale qu'est la laïcité. Étant donné sa nature normative, ce problème est abordé sous l'angle des théories normatives en philosophie morale et politique contemporaine. Il s'agit de dégager et d'analyser la conceptualisation de la laïcité présente dans l'œuvre du philosophe allemand Jürgen Habermas (1929-), plus précisément d'extraire de sa théorie de la religion et de sa théorie politique les principes constitutifs de la laïcité. Cela comprend en outre la détermination des conditions et des moyens de leur application. La religion pouvant s'insérer dans l'espace public selon deux modalités, le problème central de cette recherche se divise en deux questions. La première est celle de la mobilisation des ressources normatives de la religion pour l'orientation de la vie collective ; la seconde celle de la reconnaissance des particularismes religieux. Elle consiste donc à expliquer les réponses que leur apporte, directement ou indirectement, Habermas, de même qu'à vérifier leur force, leur validité et leur cohérence. Pour ce faire, est mise à contribution l'analyse des propositions d'autres penseurs de la religion, du social et du politique. Les propos de Habermas sont particulièrement mis en parallèle avec ceux de deux grands représentants du libéralisme politique contemporain, John Rawls et Will Kymlicka, et de Charles Taylor, un éminent représentant du communautarisme. Ce travail se divise donc en trois grandes parties. La première porte sur le concept de religion chez Habermas. Y est étudié le tournant qu'a connu la pensée habermassienne sur la religion au cours des deux dernières décennies, lequel consiste en une valorisation du potentiel sémantico-normatif de la religion en modernité. La seconde concerne l'articulation de la religion avec la raison publique. La troisième a trait à l'aménagement politique de la diversité religieuse. ______________________________________________________________________________ MOTS-CLÉS DE L’AUTEUR : citoyenneté, démocratie, démocratie délibérative, espace public, laïcité, libéralisme politique, multiculturalisme, raison publique, religion, Habermas, Kymlicka, Rawls, Taylor

This dissertation evaluates the recent academic consensus on liberal multiculturalism. I argue that this apparent consensus, by subsuming religious experience under the general category of culture, has rested upon undefended and contestable conceptions of modern religious life. In the liberal multicultural literature, cultures are primarily identified as sharing certain ethnic, linguistic, or geographic attributes, which is to say morally arbitrary particulars that can be defended without raising the possibility of conflict over metaphysical beliefs. In such theories, the possibility of conflict due to diverse religious principles or claims to the transcendent is either steadfastly ignored or, more typically, explained away as the expression of perverted religious faith. I argue that this conception of the relation between culture and religion fails to provide an account of liberal multiculturalism that is persuasive to religious believers on their own terms. To illustrate this failing, I begin with an examination of the Canadian policy of official multiculturalism and the constitutional design of Pierre Trudeau. I argue that the resistance of Québécois nationalists to liberal multiculturalism, as well as the conflict between the Québécois and minority religious groups within Quebec, has been animated by religious and quasi-religious claims to the transcendent. I maintain that to truly confront this basic problem of religious difference, one must articulate and defend the substantive visions of religious life that are implicit in liberal multicultural theory. To this end, I contrast the portrait of religious life and secularization that is implicit in Will Kymlicka’s liberal theory of minority rights with the recent account of modern religious life presented by Charles Taylor. I conclude by suggesting that Kymlicka’s and Taylor’s contrasting conceptions of religious difference—which are fundamentally at odds regarding the relation of the right to the good, and the diversity and nature of genuine religious belief—underline the extent to which liberal multicultural theory has reached an academic consensus only by ignoring the reality of religious diversity. / text

Les sociétés modernes sont de plus en plus souvent confrontées aux enjeux de la diversité. Le multiculturalisme tente d’y apporter une réponse à travers un modèle de société basé sur une politique de la reconnaissance. Selon moi, l’argumentation des multiculturalistes repose sur leur conception de l’identité. C’est pourquoi, pour apporter une critique nouvelle de ce courant de pensée, j’analyse les écrits de ses principaux défenseurs, Will Kymlicka et Charles Taylor, en concentrant mon analyse sur ce qu’ils entendent par identité. Je soutiens que leur conception ne laisse pas assez de place au potentiel d’évolution et ne considère pas suffisamment l’importance et le pouvoir de la volonté individuelle dans la construction de l’identité. En m’appuyant sur l’étude d’autres auteurs, je souligne la nécessité de considérer les frontières entre le semblable et l’autre de manière plus souple et de reconnaître que la violence peut s’exercer par la création de différences entre les personnes. J’ai choisi la figure radicale de « l’homme sans qualités » de Robert Musil pour montrer comment un individu peut devenir autonome à travers un acte de destruction créatrice. Enfin, je conclus que l’État devrait favoriser ce processus, et permettre au sujet, qui est selon moi dénué d’une nature authentique, de penser son existence comme une expérience du possible. / Modern societies are increasingly confronted with the challenge of diversity. Defenders of multiculturalism responded with a model of society based on a politics of recognition. This model can be connected to a particular conception of identity. In order to make a new contribution to the critique of this approach, this work presents an analysis of the writings of two of the main proponents: Will Kymlicka and Charles Taylor. It does so by focusing on their conception of identity and argues that it does not leave enough room for change and fails to fully recognise the importance and the impact of personal will. The works of other authors are analysed in order to emphasize the need to view the boundaries between sameness and otherness in a more flexible fashion and to acknowledge that violence can attend the creation of differences between people. The figure of the “man without qualifies” portrayed by the novelist Robert Musil is offered as emblematic of how an individual can become autonomous through an act of creative destruction. Finally, it is concluded that the state should facilitate the creation of difference and this requires allowing citizens to conceive of their lives as an experience of the possible.

Ce mémoire traite de la critique communautarienne du libéralisme et se donne deux projets. D’abord, il s’agit de formuler une position de synthèse à partir des travaux des philosophes Charles Taylor, Michael Sandel, Alasdair MacIntyre et Michael Walzer. Cette synthèse s’articule autour de trois axes, soit ontologique, sociale et méthodologique. Le deuxième projet est d’évaluer cette position pour statuer sur son rapport au libéralisme, et, plus précisément, pour déterminer si elle est seulement une critique, une alternative, ou encore une variante à l’intérieur du libéralisme. Il est conclu que le communautarisme est réconciliable avec une certaine forme de libéralisme et que sa critique permet même de l’améliorer. / In this essay about the communitarian critique of liberalism I seek to reach two goals. First, it is to form a synthesis from the works of philosophers Charles Taylor, Michael Sandel, Alasdair MacIntyre and Michael Walzer. This synthesis is articulated through three axes: ontologicial, social and methodological. Building on this, my second objective is to assess its relation to liberalism. More specifically, I seek to determine whether communitarianism is merely a critique, an alternative or a variant of liberalism. My conclusion is that communitarianism is reconciliable with a certain form of liberalism and that its critique allows to improve it.

This thesis relies on the idea that members of a culture should be able to secure the survival and flourishing of their own culture, or, in other words, that they should be self-determining. The collective will to take charge of its own destiny is the sign that a political community exists. The development of this subjectivity is made possible by a shared culture. I argue for conceptualizing self-determination in a way that recognizes both the autonomy of cultural groups and the necessity for people-to-people relations between groups. The people-to-people relations are necessary for allowing the coexistence of different peoples with the same right to self-determination. Although the contemporary discourse of liberal multiculturalism is sympathetic to cultural self-determination, it tends to undercut its own commitment by linking itself to the current systems of nation-states and specifically Western liberal ideas about recognition and empowerment. I will argue that the nationalist discourse that is specific to the literature on liberal multiculturalism intends to empower self-determining peoples, but ultimately reinforces a hierarchy of peoples in which minorities’ nationalism is instrumental to the achievement of the myth of an overarching civic nation that is embodied in the liberal state. (T1). The myth of the civic nation has its origins in the liberal principles of individualism and neutrality of the state. In the context of a multinational state, attempts to create an overarching civic nation result in efforts to domesticate and assimilate diversity. My thesis will also argue that the survival and flourishing of cultures requires both questioning the universality of the state model and developing a post-nationalist framework that would acknowledge the legitimacy of a great diversity of political communities, as such diversity is representative of the diverse cultures that sustain these political communities. (T2).

Global capital is transforming the spaces in which we live, thereby transforming culture: this thesis challenges a set of liberal assumptions about culture and cultural transformation by elaborating upon this very hypothesis. Specifically, it argues that cultural identities are being formed in global cities, where disjunctive global flows of cultural, financial, technological, ideological, and human capital intersect. These global flows are creating cultural contexts of choice that can be as central to individual and group identities as national institutions or inherited or native cultural norms. And as these modern contexts of choice emancipate the imagination from the influence of national institutions, they enable peculiar new forms of agency. I use Arjun Appadurai’s notion of imagination and his model of “scapes”—cultural landscapes formed by intersecting flows of capital—to explain how the global is becoming the decisive framework for social life. In contrast, I use Will Kymlicka’s model of multicultural citizenship and Jeremy Waldron’s model of cosmopolitanism primarily to demonstrate the limits of a class of liberal theories of cultural accommodation that oversimplify the relationship of the individual to culture, and of culture to modernity, and which ignore the role of “scapes” in constituting cultural identities. To conclude, I propose an alternative, three- dimensional and ultimately non-comparative treatment of culture inspired by Henri Lefebvre’s concept of the right to the city. / Graduate