A contribution to the political learning of civil solidarity in post-secularism: the “outline” of an Observatory of secularism, civil solidarity and tolerance

Abstract

Considering the debate between Jürgen Habermas and his critics on the problem of institutionalizing the “public use of reason” and the translation of the semantic potentials of the moral contents of religion in the post-secular public sphere, I propose in this article the formal-principled “outline” of an Observatory of secularity, civil solidarity and tolerance as a social institution embodied by normative claims assumed by the social practices of a post-secular way of life, interested in clarifying the process of formation of its post-conventional normative self-understanding and in the cooperative resolution of problems of social integration, which affect the reproduction of solidarity between religious and secular citizens, identified from public controversies on questions of “good life” and questions of justice, resorting to democratic mechanisms for the institutionalization (and transformation) of the cognitive dissonances (not always reasonable) between comprehensive doctrines. This formal-principled “outline” of an observatory can contribute to the implementation, monitoring and evaluation of programs and public policies for the political learning of enlightened secularism, civil solidarity and tolerance among citizens in societies marked by problems and social conflicts triggered by the non-equal treatment of respect, by the refusal to recognize and by the discrimination of plural forms of life, contributing to the strengthening and articulation of participatory-deliberative democratic mechanisms and bodies, capable of fostering cooperative and complementary action between the State and Civil society for the promotion of a post-secular political culture, in accordance with the political principles of the Constitution.