Human Rights, Human Dignity,and Human Experience

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paolo G. Carozza
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Common Point ◽  
Shared Understanding ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
Legal Traditions ◽  
Concrete Experience ◽  
Foundational Principle ◽  
Core Meaning ◽  
Point Of Reference

The contested understandings of human dignity today make it very problematic as a reliable principle for determining the scope and merit of particular claims of human rights (at least beyond the principle’s narrow, universally agreed-upon core meaning). Merely relying on an overlapping consensus is insufficient. Nevertheless, the beginnings of a broader shared understanding of the meaning and implications of human dignity, as a foundational principle of human rights law, can emerge from our concrete experience. As a common point of reference for critically evaluating and integrating the diversity of instantiations of human rights in differing legal traditions, the elementary experience of human dignity leads us to regard law as a vehicle for sustained and reasoned reflection on the value of human persons and on the scope of our obligations to respect and protect them.

Universal Human Dignity: Some Reflections in the Asian Context

2008 ◽  
Vol 3 ◽  
pp. 1-33 ◽  
Author(s):  
Man Yee Karen Lee
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Belief Systems ◽  
Cross Cultural ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
Political Systems ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
Cultural Perspective ◽  
Asian Context ◽  
Common Association

AbstractThe idea of “human dignity” is accorded a prominent status in domestic constitutions and international human rights law. Its symbolism as a universal ground of human rights sits awkwardly with the absence of a precise definition. The concept has evolved over history and has been interpreted in various ways by people holding different worldviews. The elusive nature of human dignity creates challenges when it is evaluated across cultures. Despite its common association with the concept of liberal democracy, the idea of human worthiness is not necessarily absent in Asian societies, many of which function under alternative political systems.A cross-cultural perspective requires putting aside ethnocentrism and exploring the convergence of views from different belief systems. Examples from Confucianism and Islam may provide insights on how human dignity is understood and realized in various Asian contexts.

Part III Structural Principles, Ch.14 Human Dignity

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carozza Paolo G
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Universal Declaration ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
Structural Principles ◽  
International Human ◽  
The Right ◽  
International Instruments

This article examines the issue of human dignity in relation to human rights. It analyses the functions and principle of human dignity and its use in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights and other international instruments. It suggests that human dignity seems to help justify expansive interpretations of human rights and strengthens the centrality and importance of the right in question and limiting possible exceptions or limitations to that right. This article also contends that the difficulty of reaching greater consensus on the meaning and implications of human dignity in international human rights law may be attributed to the fact that it refers to both a foundational premise of human rights and to a principle that affect interpretation and application of specific human rights.

scholarly journals Exploring the use of the concept human dignity in disability human rights law: from UNCRPD to EctHR

2021 ◽  
pp. 27-53
Author(s):  
Elif Celik
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Case Law ◽  
Recent History ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
Persons With Disabilities ◽  
European Court ◽  
History Of

The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) accommodates the concept of human dignity more fully than does any other human rights treaty. The role and interpretation of dignity is thus particularly interesting from the perspective of disability human rights and case law. This study examines the role and significance of the concept of dignity in relation to the human rights disability discourse and jurisdiction through the guidance and impact of the CRPD. It examines the currently available jurisprudence of the CRPD Committee and the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) in light of the CRPD, seeking to identify the rights that are particularly related to the concept of dignity through the perspective of disability and to identify the requirements of the respect for dignity for persons with disabilities. While accepting the limitations of the sources in this examination due to the recent history of the CRPD, the study nevertheless locates some points where human dignity has particular relevance to the realisation of the rights protected in the CRPD.

scholarly journals The duty to work as precondition for human dignity: a Swiss perspective on work programmes

2020 ◽  
pp. 89-112
Author(s):  
Melanie Studer ◽  
Kurt Pärli
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Fundamental Rights ◽  
Eligibility Criterion ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
International Human ◽  
The Right ◽  
Federal Supreme

In Switzerland, the participation in certain work programmes is an eligibility criterion to social assistance benefits and the constitutionally granted right to the financial means required for a decent standard of living. This chapter examines whether the implementation of these programmes is in accordance with fundamental rights and more precisely, whether they respect the normative framework elaborated in Chapter 4. As will be shown, the right to financial assistance when in need has close links to human dignity. Therefore, the evaluation of the mentioned work programmes against the human rights background leads to some critical conclusions on their compatibility with international human rights law in general and human dignity in particular. Especially, the authors argue that the Swiss Federal Supreme Court’s case law lacks a comprehensive approach for the evaluation of human rights infringements in this context.

Fundamentals of Human Rights Theory

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher McCrudden
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
Epistemological Problem ◽  
Human Rights Practice ◽  
System P ◽  
Dependent Theory ◽  
Normative Foundation ◽  
Ontological Problem

The previous three chapters described three central problems that recur when courts have to deal with religious litigation: the teleological problem, epistemological problem, and ontological problem. All three problems are both the occasion for disputes, and (taken together) exacerbate other disputes, bringing the courts themselves into the fray, preventing them from playing the role of standing above the conflict. So, what is to be done? This chapter proposes a reconstructed practice-dependent theory of human rights that addresses issues of religion. It discusses how human dignity provides a normative foundation for the system of human rights as a whole. The proposed theory accepts that human rights law and human rights practice beyond the legal sphere is pluralistic, and that building this pluralism into human rights theory accurately reflects the diverse nature of human rights, including judicial adjudication and religious narratives within that system.

The Ontological Problem

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher McCrudden
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Legal Interpretation ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
Specific Element ◽  
The Third ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Ontological Problem

This chapter deals with the third of three problems that dominate religious litigation, the ontological problem, which arises in two particular respects in the relationship between human rights law and religion. The first respect is in the need to give content to the ‘human’ in ‘human rights’, and we see religions and legal interpretation giving diverse, and sometimes conflicting, answers to this question. One of the contested sites of this conflict is over how we are to understand the idea of ‘human dignity’, which is seen by several religions and by the human rights system as a foundational concept for the understanding of human rights. The second respect in which the ontological problem arises has to do with a specific element in what it means to be human, namely the place of religion in that understanding. Is religion central to our view of what it means to be human, and are protections for religion central, therefore, to the human rights enterprise? Or should we, rather, view religion as marginal, or even contrary to our conception of what it means to be fully human, and query whether religion should be part of human rights protections at all?

scholarly journals Human Rights Theory and Comparative International Law Scholarship

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Christopher McCrudden
Keyword(s):  
Human Rights ◽  
International Law ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
International Human Rights Law ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
International Human Rights ◽  
Human Rights Treaties ◽  
Domestic Courts ◽  
Domestic Use ◽  
International Human

An account of what we know about the use by domestic courts of international human rights law is identified, based on the findings in this volume and earlier work on the use of the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW). From that, three aspects of the domestic functions of international human rights treaties are tentatively identified as particularly significant: international human rights law is only partly internationally-directed; domestic courts very seldom appear to be acting as ‘agents’ of international human rights law; and ‘human dignity’ (sometimes by itself, sometimes alongside ‘autonomy’ and ‘equality’) acts as an important meta-principle in the domestic use of international human rights law. The implications these functions have for normative theorising about human rights, in particular practice-dependent theories of human rights, is considered, and a theory of human rights law consistent with this practice is identified.

scholarly journals A Human Right Approach of Right to Health During Pandemic

2021 ◽  
pp. 176-179
Author(s):  
Dr. Prakruthi A R
Keyword(s):  
Public Health ◽  
Human Rights ◽  
Human Dignity ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
Good Health ◽  
Human Rights Law ◽  
Human Right ◽  
Effective Response ◽  
Freedom Of Movement ◽  
The Right

The right to live isn’t the absence of death; it’s living a life with good health and human dignity.’ Human rights are fundamentally linked to global health in the context of the COVID-19 pandemic. Human rights law guarantees everyone the right to the highest attainable standard of health and obligates governments to take steps to prevent threats to public health and to provide medical care to those who need it. The language and principles of human rights relate to the rights that support the survival and basic wellbeing of communities and individuals, including their rights to life, health and an adequate standard of living. Human rights law also recognizes that in the context of serious public health threats and public emergencies threatening the life of the Nation, restrictions on some rights can be justified when they have a legal basis, are strictly necessary, based on scientific evidence and neither arbitrary nor discriminatory in application, of limited duration, respectful of human dignity, subject to review, and proportionate to achieve the objective. The scale and severity of the COVID-19 pandemic clearly rises to the level of a public health threat that could justify restrictions on certain rights, such as those that result from the imposition of quarantine or isolation limiting freedom of movement. At the same time, careful attention to human rights such as non-discrimination and human rights principles such as transparency and respect for human dignity can foster an effective response amidst the turmoil and disruption that inevitably results in times of crisis and limit the harms that can come from the imposition of overly broad measures that do not meet the criteria.

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