The question “should there be group rights?” is ill put. Proposed rights cannot be evaluated without reference to the contexts in which they are asserted or to the purposes for which they will be exercised. I believe a further constraint is also necessary, concerning the impact of group aspirations on democratic politics. Because it seems to me to be the most fundamental question, I begin with it, turning second to questions of context and purpose, and concluding with some remarks on institutional design in the light of the intervening discussion.

Democracy's constraint

In most countries of the modern world, democracy exhibits a non-optional character that other political ideals lack. In the United States, for instance, few would take seriously the proposition that the state may require people to be liberal or conservative, or religious or secular, but equally few would deny the proposition that they can be required to accept the results of appropriately functioning democratic procedures. We are thought free to despise the government, but not its right to be the government. Of course different people understand different things by democracy, and every democratic order will be thought by some not to be functioning as it should, in the corrupt control of an illicit minority, or otherwise in need of repair. But the very terms of such objections to democracy affirm its obligatory character, since it is the malfunction or corruption of democracy which is being objected to.