Minority practices and principles of toleration

In a multicultural society, different groups entertain different conceptions of the good life. The wider society cannot be expected indiscriminately to tolerate all kinds of minority practices, nor can it justifiably ban all practices that diverge from its own. This raises the question as to how it should decide which practices to tolerate and which ones to ban. The appeal to such principles as the society's fundamental values, human rights, and no-harm runs into difficulties. This paper suggests that the principles of toleration cannot be laid down in advance, and are best elicited by means of an open-minded intercommunal dialogue aimed at evolving a reasonable consensus.