TALAL ASADintegrity is, of course, fundamental to this. Its administrative institutions may be able to
carry through decisions politically arrived at, or they may find themselves confronted with
obstacles. But logically this process does not seem to me to require a principled reference
by the state to ‘‘the proper place of religion’’ in a secular society—any more than it needs
to have a principled reference to ‘‘the proper place’’ ofanything. Viewed in historical
perspective, the political culture of the modern nation-state is never homogeneous or
unchanging, never unchallengeable or unchallenged. The ways in which the concept of
‘‘religion’’ operates in that culture asmotiveand aseffect, how it mutates, what it affords
and obstructs, what memories it shelters or excludes, are not eternally fixed. That is what
makes varieties of secularism—including Frenchlaı ̈cite ́—always unique.
If one accepts this conclusion, one may resist the temptation to think that one must
either ‘‘defend secularism’’ or ‘‘attack civic religion.’’ One might instead learn to argue
about the best ways of supporting particular liberties while limiting others, of minimizing
social and individual harm. In brief, one might content oneself with assessingparticular
demands and threats without having to confront thegeneral‘‘danger of religion.’’
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