Veiled Women and the Affect of Religion in Democracy

The veiled woman troubles feminism and secularism in much the same way. Both feminism and secularism face a problem of finding a position that respects individual autonomy, and simultaneously sustains a conception of politics freed from heteronomous determination. This article gives an account of what is being resisted and by whom in modes of politics which seek to produce an autonomous subject emancipated from ‘other laws’(heteronomy). It also draws on Jean-Luc Nancy in order to consider what has been termed the problem of Islam in Europe as a wider juridical and political problem centred on the significance of affect as heteronomy. It thus explores the tension between piety and polity.