Freedom for All? The Strength and Limits of Political Tolerance

Abstract

Most research on political tolerance relying on the ‘least-liked’ group approach has painted a bleak picture of low and feeble levels of tolerance. An alternative approach, permitting an evaluation of the breadth of tolerance, is combined with the use of survey experiments to demonstrate that tolerance varies considerably across target groups. Specifically, the formation of tolerance judgements is shown to differ depending on a group’s association with violent and non-democratic behaviour. Thus, tolerance is high and resilient towards groups that themselves observe democratic rights – even if these groups are disliked or feared. The theory suggests that this is caused by norms of reciprocity and, contrary to extant research, this article shows that within the limits set by these norms, tolerance is strong.