Human dignity and socio-economic rights

• Author: Izabela Bratiloveanu
• Position: University of Craiova, Craiova - Romania
• Pages: 1-6

AGORA International Journal of Juridical Sciences, www.juridicalj ournal.univagora.ro

ISSN 1843-570X, E-ISSN 2067-7677

No. 4 (2013), pp. 1-6

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HUMAN DIGNITY AND SOCIO-ECONOMIC RIGHTS

I. Bratiloveanu

*

Izabela Bratiloveanu

Faculty of Law and Administrative Sciences,

University of Craiova, Craiova, Romania

*Correspondence: Bratiloveanu Izabela, Craiova, 8 Horia St., Bl. E2, sc. 2, ap.2

E-mail: bratiloveanuisabela@yahoo.com

Abstract

In current society, where the gap between rich and poor is widening

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, human dignity

is invoked very frequently in relation to socio-economic rights. We analyze in this study the

jurisprudence of the Romanian Constitutional Court and the recent jurisprudence of the

European Court of Human Rights.

Keywords: human dignity, socio-economic rights.

Introduction

Today, the poor are considered human beings who are in a position of vulnerability.

Fighting against poverty and social exclusion that accompanies it is now a struggle for

recognition of the poor as human beings and members of society as worthy as everyone else.

To recognize the other as equal in dignity involves treating him with respect and being united

with him. Every man therefore appears as “stems from a normative relationship with himself

and all the other people at the same time” as far as dignity is accompanied by a “recognition

order”

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, an “obligation of action”

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which engages the other. All human rights are universal,

inseparable, interdependent and intimately related and must be treated in a fair and balanced

manner, on an equal footing and giving them equal importance

4

. The Human Rights Council

of the United Nations said in a recent resolution that “the ideal of free human beings, free

from fear and poverty can only be achieved if conditions are created to enable everyone to

enjoy the economic, social and cultural rights, as well as civil and political rights”

5

.

Human Dignity and Extreme Poverty in the Jurisprudence of the Constitutional

Court of Romania

* Ph.D. Candidate, Fac ulty of Law and Administrative Sciences, University of Craiova. This work was financed

from the contract POSDRU/CPP107/DMI1.5/S/78421, strategic project ID78421 (2010), funded by the

European Social Fund - “Invest in people”, the Operational Program Human Resources Development 20 07-

2013.

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According to the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (O.E.C.D.) average incomes o f the

rich people 10% of the populations are now nine times higher than those of the poor, the difference increased by

10% since 1980. Studies are reported after a certain income, those who do not get are considered poor. O.E.C.D.

set as reference the income in each state analyzed. Being a value changing i s called "relative poverty." T o define

the "absolute poverty" it is taken into account the a verage income in a given year that is determined as the border

of poverty, as it is determined how many have come under this limit in the crisis.

2

Pech T, La dignité humaine. Du droit à l’éthique de la relation , Éthique publique, volume 3, no. 2, 2001, p. 95.

3

Pettiti L.E., La dignité de la personne humaine, in M.L. Pavia, Th. Revet, La dignité de la personne humaine,

coll. Études juridiques, volume 7, Paris, Economica, 1999, p. 54 .

4

The United Nation Human Rights Council, A/CHR/RES/8/2 Resolution 8/2, the Optional Protocol to the

International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.

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The United Nation Human Rights Council, A/CHR/RES/8/11 Resolution 8/11, Human rights and extreme

poverty, June 18

th

, 2008.