Human Dignity

257 Pages·2011·3.153 MB·English

by  George Kateb

Human Dignity
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Human Dignity
(cid:2)(cid:3)
George Kateb
The Belknap Press of
Harvard University Press
Cambridge, Massachusetts, and London, England
2011
Copyright © 2011 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Kateb, George.
Human dignity / George Kateb.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-674-04837-9 (alk. paper)
1. Human rights. 2. Dignity. I. Title.
JC571.K343 2011
323—dc22 2010025821
To Sharon Cameron

Contents
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Preface ix
Acknowledgments xv
1. The Idea of Human Dignity 1
2. Individual Status and Human Rights 28
3. Human Uniqueness: Traits and Attributes 113
4. Human Stature and Great Achievements 174
Bibliography 219
Index 227

Preface
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The subject of human dignity is the worth of human beings or their
high rank, or even their special place in nature. If we want to think
about human dignity we should not remain content with a defi nition
of the term or a short account that fails to acknowledge the idea’s dif-
fi culty. The idea is diffi cult, even though it is rather casually used in
many kinds of ceremonial or more substantial public speech, especially
when such speech involves praising human rights. We can break down
the diffi culty into many diffi culties, which are linked. One main diffi -
culty is working out the distinction between the dignity of human be-
ings in their relations with one another and the dignity of the human
species in relation to other species and to nature as a whole. But there
are other diffi culties. Trying to deal with one diffi culty may unsettle the
conclusion we thought we had reached about another. I emphasize the
conceptual or theoretical diffi culties in this essay, not the formidable
diffi culties that stand in the way of the realization of the idea in prac-
tices and institutions or in taking the idea ever more seriously where it
is already partly realized. No society fully realizes the dignity of the in-
dividual, though some societies come closer than others. In their awful
luck, many societies have barely the beginnings and some have none.
On the other hand, to say what the dignity of the species is will depend
on trying to ascertain the human difference from the rest of nature.
The fi rst part of the book takes up the dignity of individuals, or what