An International Legal Perspective on Human Dignity: The Extrinsic Recognition of an Intrinsic Condition

Abstract Human dignity plays an important role in the international legal order, and references to the principle can be found in various international human rights instruments. Its meaning, however, remains an object of avid discussion due to the impossibility of finding a precise and timeless way of defining the concept. In this article, we argue that acknowledging inherence as an element of human dignity gives extrinsic legal recognition to an intrinsic human condition and tends to expand human dignity’s influence. Vagueness — or openness — in defining the concept provides for a dynamic and evolutionary understanding of human dignity, and, coupled with the idea of inherence, these characteristics represent tools for universalization and adaptation of the concept to new circumstances. These findings are based on a review of philosophical discussions of the idea of human dignity, followed by an analysis of how it is addressed in international legal instruments and international jurisprudence and identification of its recurrent elements. We defend the view that the vagueness of its definition does not mean that its content is impossible to identify in particular circumstances. Scholars and institutions can have a concrete sense of the meaning of human dignity even though its substance may admit new elements as new social demands emerge. In our view, the essential meaning of human dignity is founded on the influence of the whole body of human rights as well as on its particular connection to the rights of social minorities, in which human dignity is emphasized because of the material precariousness of such groups under social systems that subject them to discriminatory treatment.