Religious asylum, between liberal and Republican reading: What challenges for democratic societies?

This article resituates analyses on religious asylum in a reflection on democracy. Religious asylum as a special form of civil disobedience opens an inquiry into the legitimacy of the latter in a democratic context. We first examine the contradictions raised by civil disobedience in relation to the liberal and republican conceptions of political obligation in a democracy. We then focus on religious asylum, and finally examine how each of the previous conceptions of democracy can justify or, conversely, restrict this form of civil disobedience.