It is great honour to edit this collection of outstanding articles on the philosophy of Charles Taylor. The contributors are distinguished scholars in their fields who have shown a critical interest in Taylor's work over the years of its development. Their contributions, written specifically for this Festschrift, pose questions on a variety of critical issues in Taylor's philosophy that are at the leading edge of debates across the humanities and social sciences. In his wide-ranging reply Taylor responds by rearticulating the fundamental features of his philosophy in a new and thought-provoking manner, which will, no doubt, set the stage for further debate.

Charles (Chuck) Taylor is one of the best known and most widely respected philosophers of the present age. In an era of specialisation he is one of the few thinkers who has developed a comprehensive philosophy which speaks to the conditions of the contemporary age in a way that is compelling to specialists in the various disciplines and comprehensible to the general reader. Here he is in the rare company of scholars such as Sir Isaiah Berlin and Richard Rorty. Whereas his works such as The explanation of behaviour (1964), Hegel (1975), and Philosophical papers (1985) are addressed primarily to specialists, Hegel and modern society (1979), The ethics of authenticity (1992), Reconciling the solitudes (1993) and Multiculturalism and ‘the politics of recognition’ (1992) are written for a more general audience.