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We inhabit a world of differences - cultural, religious, moral, philosophical. The question that preoccupies the contributors to this volume is whether the fact of difference - plurality - inevitably leads to the conclusion that there cannot be a single truth, even in moral matters. As befits a volume on pluralism, it brings together a wide variety of contributors with different backgrounds and distinctive skills and attitudes. The implications of plurality are examined with regard to religion, morality and philosophy itself, but the essays range widely to consider how we should respond at the social and political levels to the facts of plurality and the claims of the pluralist. No reader will be left in any doubt that the debate about pluralism raises questions that are fundamental not only for philosophical argumentation but for society at large.

While the modern world is divided into roughly 200 sovereign states, many of the problems we are experiencing are global in scale and cannot be solved by nation states acting alone. The one world has many different traditions, too: very different ideas exist about how a nation state should be organised politically, the universality of human rights, relations between women and men - indeed, about everything of any importance. Different developments in our world pose a challenge to legal and social philosophers. What can we say about justice in a pluralist world? Is there some universal justice? Are there universal human rights? What is the function of the state in the modern world? How should the law deal with global problems, such as the environment or migration? And how can we or should we argue about such issues? Such are the problems dealt with by the 20th world congress of the International Association for Philosophy of Law and Social Philosophy, held in Amsterdam in June 2001 and published in this book, which can be read with pleasure and profit by legal and social philosophers, students of human rights, political philosophers and all those who want to know about the challenges posed to the law by modernity

Cover -- Half Title -- Dedication -- Title Page -- Copyright Page -- Table of Contents -- Preface -- From Value Pluralism to Liberalism -- Liberal Legitimacy, Reasonable Disagreement and Justice -- Neutrality and Recognition -- Consensus, Neutrality and Compromise -- Multiculturalism, Secularism and the State -- Imposing Liberal Principles -- Pluralism Within the Limits of Reason Alone? Habermas and the Discursive Negotiation of Consensus -- Identity and Multicultural Politics -- The Idea of Cultural Patrimony -- Notes on Contributors -- Abstracts -- Index.

The dissolution of the U.S.S.R. marked also the end of the communist system. However, its replacement by a working democracy is not assured. First a 'civil society', built upon a pluralistic infrastructure, has to be established. This requires the achievement of a 'law-based state', pluralism in the political media, an unshackled media, and freedom of religion. The distinguished experts in these fields brought together in this book question whether such an infrastructure is firm enough as yet to preclude reversion to an authoritarian system. Current events in Russia form an experiment of incalculable importance to the future of the international system - Russian Pluralism-Now Irreversible? offers a lucid, stimulating assessment of the experiment's chances for success