CHRISTOPHER YORKE BULWARKING DEMOCRACY Raphael Cohen-Almagor, The Scope of Tolerance: Studies on the costs of free expression and freedom of the press. London: Routledge, 2006, xv + 277 pp. Delimiting the appropriate boundaries of free expression is a thor- ny theoretical problem particular to the Western liberal democra- cies that have a principled commitment to tolerance. Where tolerance is not viewed as a good to be promoted, questions regarding its scope need not arise. Thus it should not be surprising that The Scope of Tolerance, Cohen-Almagor’s third installment in his trilogy of books on the subject of tolerance and free expres- sion, focuses largely on case studies drawn from the legal and socio-political milieus of Canada, the United States, the United Kingdom, and Israel. Cohen-Almagor provides his readers with a good survey of the vocabulary and basic conceptual territory of tolerance, before moving on to elucidate his own position. He defines tolerance as: composed of three main components: (1) a strong disapproving attitude toward a certain conduct, action or speech; (2) power or authority to curtail the disturbing conduct; and (3) moral overriding principles which sway the doer not to exert his or her power or authority to curtail the said conduct (26À7). Formulaically, then, tolerance consists of principled restraint from using some available means to stem behaviour which has trig- gered disapprobation. That disapprobation is central to the defini- tion of tolerance means that it is easily distinguished from neutrality À the tolerating agent has been offended in some way by the behav- iour in question, and thus can be assumed to have strong feelings about it (27). Yet the tolerating agent, also by definition, resists exercising her power upon the tolerated; perhaps because she realis- es that ‘as humans we have the need to express ourselves and, there- fore, suppressing speech in itself is a form of damage’ which should not be lightly inflicted upon another (5). Even if the tolerating agent Res Publica (2007) 13:101À106 Ó Springer 2006 DOI 10.1007/s11158-006-9011-x