Call for Registrations: Online Workshop, ‘Human Dignity and Human Rights - Rethinking the

Call for Registrations: Online Workshop, ‘Human Dignity and Human Rights - Rethinking the Connection’ (July 7-9 2021)

Keynote speakers:

• Anne Phillips (London School of Economics)

• Andrea Sangiovanni (King’s College London/European University Institute)

• David Livingstone Smith (University of New England)

Full schedule available at https://www.humandignity.online/

Human rights instruments, such as the Universal Declaration, presuppose a tight connection between possessing dignity and having human rights. Philosophical accounts frequently echo this presupposition, taking dignity to name the inherent quality that serves as a foundation for human rights. The aims of this workshop are to challenge this presumed connection between being human, possessing human dignity, and having human rights, and to provide a forum to explore alternatives. Topics to be covered include:

• Can dignity provide a truly universal foundation for human rights?

• Are there alternative conceptions of dignity that do not presuppose specific cognitive capacities, and if so what relationship do these alternatives bear to human rights?

• What is the relationship between being human and having dignity?

• How else might we justify human rights, if not through the concept of human dignity?

• What is the relationship between dignity and dehumanization?

Registration is free, but please email the organiser (Suzanne.Killmister@monash.edu) for logistics.