This post is the second part of the the same book from last week. The book published at http://www.corteidh.or.cr/tablas/r30885.pdf
The concept of autonomy is often perceived as significant in relation to dignity. Gerald Dworkin notes various substantive understandings, including liberty and freedom of the will, and the association of the idea with, for example, self-assertion. Dworkin summarizes the function of autonomy as moral, political, and social idea. The content of degrading treatment case-law indicates that dignity in this social sense is not the concern of degradation in the human rights law sphere. This does not involve damage to reputation or standing acquired in the basis of merit to one's position in societal affairs. The Court's understanding of degradation appears to be defined by the violation of something fundamental, by treating a person in a way that is considered inappropriate for a person to be treated. In relation to rank, position, reputation, or character, however, the Commission statement suggest that this is relevant, but only if it is tied to human dignity. The invocation of the notion of rank is helpful, in understanding the form of violation of dignity that the concept of degradation can be seen to encapsulate. It can indeed be seen to maintain the idea of "grade" and lowering of rank. Alongside those dictionary meaning, others contain the idea of lowering:" to lower in estimation, to bring into dishonour or contempt", to lower in character or quality. It is used to express deterioration of something valuable. This idea of lowering can be seen to capture the key feature of the idea of degradation. This appriach to the term rank is useful in that of present a tie between the idea of rank and use of the concept of dignity in the human rights context. In a discussion, which highlights the contribution of equal high rank amongst human beings, with a sort of universalization for all humans. The understading of degradation is undeniable that has considerable practical weight. The fundamental insight from the degrading treatment jurisprudence of the ECtHR lies in the characterization of degradation in terms of particular conceptual relationship between degradation, humiliation, autonomy, and rank. The term "dehumanization" refers in the most basic terms to the denial, in part or whole, of the humanity of a person or group of persons. It is possible to think of degrees of dehumanization; we might speak of extreme or "mild" forms of dehumanization, the former occurring in instances of, for example, genocide and torture, and the latter in the everyday structures of social, political and economic marginalization. For what these have in common is their foundation in attitudes of exclusion. of which the psychological processes are alike, no matter the severity of the consequences. While systematic exclusion is in most cases a gradual process by which "over time, harms and dissimilarities eclipse benefits and similarities, gradually moving persons and groups outside the scope of justice", it is possible to identify active strategies of dehumanization, such as labeling, which occurs not only in extreme cases but also in the everyday situations . Dehumanization, then, is the process by which human beings are rendered so radically other that it becomes possible for their persecutors to commit murder and for bystanders to stand by without objection or remorso. For this all the humiliation, defamation, degradations: the provision of a false motive to the perpetrators of gross violations. Gentille, the female protagonist of Gil Courtemanche's novel "A Sunday by the Pool in Kigali," provides readers with a sense of what dehumanization might means for the victims. Gentille's semi-fictional story recalls countless testimonial narratives of dehumanization in which victims are all too often reduced, through acts of physical and discursive violencen to the status of objectified, fragmented and abject bodies emptied of "human" subjectivity. Human dignity might be understood as a term for the most basic human rights. In this sense human dignity would be violated if the most fundamental liberties and rights were at stake. Human dignity is understood as "the right to have rights". This concept of human dignity refers to some reflections of Hannah Arendt in her analysis of totalitarianism. This concept of human dignity emphasizes the rights-orientation of human dignity. Human dignity as the basis of human rights. This idea is formulated in the context of the human rights framework itself. In the course of Western history the development of the human rights framework was accompanied by the development of specific institutions, like the nation state and democracy. We speak about human dignity as if it were a property of humans like having green eyes or black hair. The formulation that we have human dignity would then articulate the conviction that this moral demand for respect is not constituted in the act of ascribing human dignity. To have human dignity means that we owe this respect to human beings in a categorical sense, which means that the validity of this demand does not depend upon specific laws or specific social practices of respect. This book sketches a partial account of human dignity. According to the account dignity is preeminent and unconditional value, possessed by all persons, that is, beings who have certain psychological capacities, including autonomy. Each person who has the capacities mentioned possesses woth equal to that of every other person, no matter how well- or ill- developed the capacities may be. The questions here are: What philosophical role does human dignity play within the realm of human rights? And the other way around: What exactly is the conceptual function of human rights for preserving human dignity? Constitutional lawyers debating this question have shown that four different alternatives must be distinguished when it comes to explaining and interpreting this interrelation. 1) The Ground of Human Rights: This rest on the assumption that the idea of dignity is the normative basis from which human rights can be derived. Dignity is not itself a human right but the justificatory "ground" from which to deduce and proclaim concrete human rights. It is because human beings have dignity or equal worth that they also have special human rights. So dignity must be understood as a presupposition for having human rights. as their necessary, but also sufficient condition. 2) A Special Human Rights: Following a second interpretation, human dignity should not be taken as primordially grounding of human rights but rather as a right itself, even though a special one, for this right tells the legal system what the most important human good is that needs protection in constitutional law. This can be seen as a historical insight due to the barbarism of the twentieth century. 3) Dignity as the Sum of Human Rights: The third interpretation takes the notion of dignity as the aggregate or "sum" of human rights. In consequence, the Universal Declaration of Human rights is to be interpreted as a list of necessary aspects of human dignity. 4) Dignity as the Purpose of Human Rights: The fourth interpretation starts by sharing importsnt intuitions of the three others. The historical commitment to human dignity that we can find in the relevant legal documents should be seen as some sort of explicit reason, why we proclaim all human rights today; as necessary legal conditions for living a life in dignity. In consequence, human dignity is the goal of human rights. Every human being can be regarded as equal as we can presuppose that they all have the same human interest to live a life in dignity. Every human being has human rights because we are all deeply vulnerable. Legal protection is needed where dignity of a human being is in acute or severe danger. Not all persons have full dignity, but due to the moral and also political claim that they should all count as legally equal, they all have the same universal rights, which have to be respect, protected and fulfilled. To state it briefly: Because human beings do not already have equal human dignity, they all have equal human rights.
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