ABSTRACT
Recent debates about Islam and society in France have raised issues central to contemporary liberal political theory. I address here two of these issues in the context of the French debates. Both concern the limits of toleration, or the conditions under which a majority in a society accepts as suitable or appropriate social norms associated with a subgroup. The first issue is the right of exit, the right to become non-members without loss of personal security or property. Exit problems have been raised most notoriously for Islam because of several highly publicized charges of apostasy (most notably that levied at Salman Rushdie), but the issue is a more general one. It arises, for example, when North American communities of Mennonites or Hopis make a resident’s property rights contingent on his or her full participation in community life.1
