Diskurstheorie der Demokratie und Religion

The debate about religion and the public sphere is characterised by a flawed alternative. While liberal opinions tend to regard religious contributions as invalid because they are unable to satisfy the principle of public justification, pro-religion inclusivists call for the principle of public justification to be limited because only in this way can religious contributions be accepted. Based on fundamental assumptions from discourse theory, this study endeavours to demonstrate that it is possible to adopt a standpoint which adheres to the principle of public justification and an epistemic understanding of democratic policy, while at the same time attempting to determine the relationship between religion and the public sphere inclusively. However, in this respect there is one belief that both political liberalism and inclusivists share: religious contributions are fundamentally unable to fulfil the criterion of general acceptability.