“100 The Arts Past and Present Assignment 6 Option 1 – Cultural Encounters and Cultural Exemptions Liberal philosophers should support cultural exemptions because cultural exemptions promote autonomy. Explain and evaluate this argument.”

If any liberal discussion of autonomy were to take place, it may be helpful to distinguish between two complementary aspects of autonomy – namely, non-perfectionist and perfectionist autonomy.

Non-perfectionist autonomy holds that autonomy is a right to make certain personal decisions free from unwarranted outsider interference. There are two main types of argument for this position: the Kantian argument – proposing that individuals exist as ends in themselves because they possess a rational will, and the Utilitarian arguments – grounded in an ideal of the permanent interests of man as a progressive being (Mill, 1989, p.14).

Perfectionist autonomy occurs when the individual exists free from unnecessary affectations of innermost desires. Perfectionist autonomy also has two relative arguments: the Kantian sense of autonomy considers individuals to be autonomous insofar as they a…(short extract)