Why cosmoi politanism in a post-secular age? Taylor and Habermas on European vs American exceptionalism

Abstract

While Taylor and Habermas respectively follow communitarian vs cosmopolitan lines in their political theories, trends in each of their writings on religion in a global context have taken surprising turns toward convergence. However, what both views lack would be a further analytical and normative classification that better captures the pluralistic dimensions of this shared turn. I consider Taylor’s critique of Habermas’ appeals to constitutional patriotism that lead to recanting the exceptionalist thesis attributed to the USA in order to own up to the exceptionalism of European secularity. I then take up the more pragmatic concern of the religion in a global public, using their writings on Islam in the USA and in the EU as a litmus test for the epistemic scope of our respective degrees of Jamesian openness, referring to the inherent potentials for the moral, social and political integration of immigrants and minorities into a more encompassing cosmoipolitanism.