Charles Taylor's initial inquiry, which considers whether the institutions of liberal democratic government make room - or should make room - for recognizing the worth of distinctive cultural traditions, remains the centerpiece of this discussion. It is now joined by Jurgen Habermas's extensive essay on the issues of recognition and the democratic constitutional state and by K. Anthony Appiah's commentary on the tensions between personal and collective identities, such as those shaped by religion, gender, ethnicity, race, and sexuality, and the dangerous tendency of multicultural politics to gloss over such tensions.

Charles Taylor is Professor of Philosophy and Political Science at McGill University; K. Anthony Appiah, Professor of Afro-American Studies and Philosophy at Harvard University; Jürgen Habermas, Professor of Philosophy at Johann Wolfgang Goethe-Universitat, Frankfurt am Main; Steven C. Rockefeller, Professor of Religion at Middlebury College; Michael Walzer, Permanent Member of the Faculty at the School of Social Sciences at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton; Susan Wolf, Professor of Philosophy at The Johns Hopkins University; and Amy Gutmann, Laurance S. Rockefeller University Professor of Politics and Director of the University Center for Human Values at Princeton University.