Liberal democracy’s secular theory rests on two mutually contradictory myths

Evidence

In fact liberal democracy here expresses the two secular myths that are, notoriously, at odds with each other: the Enlightenment myth of politics as a discourse of public reason whose bond with knowledge enables the elite to direct the education of mankind, and the revolutionary myth of universal suffrage, a politics of large numbers in which the representation of “collective will” is sought by quantifying the opinion and fantasy of individual citizen-electors. The secular theory of state toleration is based on these contradictory foundations: on the one hand elite liberal clarity seeks to contain religious passion, on the other hand democratic numbers allow majorities to dominate minorities even if both are religiously formed. — Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular, 300

Categorization

• XREF: Complicates the Cooper thread: the secular toleration Asad dissects here parallels how Cooper shows liberal-neutral-sounding governance quietly encodes a particular moral community; both show the ‘neutral liberal state’ resting on particular, contradictory foundations. — connects to: Liberal democracy’s liberal-democratic tension is a paradox, not a fatal contradiction — Chantal Mouffe, The Democratic Paradox, 53; Liberal democracy contains a paradox Schmitt’s critique exposes — Chantal Mouffe, The Democratic Paradox, 162