Are Toleration and Neutrality Incompatible Ideals?

It is regularly claimed that liberal toleration is obsolete, for at least two reasons: First, that the circumstances of toleration are absent in relations between rulers and citizens in ideal democratic states; and second, that the liberal ideal of toleration has been superseded by toleration as recognition. Both versions of the ‘obsolescence’ objection are flawed and the ideal of liberal toleration remains a relevant and attractive guide to managing conflict in conditions of reasonable pluralism.