Call for Papers: "In Search for a Social Minimum: Human Dignity, Poverty and Human Rights"

Special Workshop at the IVR World Congress “Dignity, Democracy, Diversity”
July 7-13, 2019, University of Lucerne, Switzerland
​Conference website: www.ivr2019.org/special-workshops
Convenors: Elena Pribytkova (New York University School of Law) & Gottfried Schweiger (University of Salzburg)

This workshop is aimed at discussing a social minimum as a set of human rights guarantees aimed at protecting individuals from poverty and enabling them to lead a dignified life. From theoretical and practical perspectives, the special workshop will analyze the interrelation of dignity, poverty and human rights and, in particular, the role of the concept of human dignity in justifying the social minimum principle and the right to a dignified existence. The concept of dignity is widely used in philosophical and legal theories to criticize the injustice of poverty, to underpin human rights of the poor as well as to develop social and global justice programs. At the same time, there are some valid doubts as to the capacity of contemporary broad and vague interpretations of human dignity to serve as a basis for human rights in general and the human right to a dignified existence in particular.
​
Against this backdrop this workshop is interested in discussing, among others, the following questions:
• How can the concept of human dignity be used to criticize poverty?
• Does poverty always constitute a violation of human dignity and human rights?
• What does a dignity-based protection against poverty entail?
• What is the relation between human dignity and the (human) rights of particular groups (e.g. children, persons with disabilities)?
• Can human dignity sufficiently justify and specify human rights guarantees of a social minimum? • How should the content and scope of the human right to a dignified existence be defined?
• How a social minimum is determined in international and domestic human rights law?
• To what extent the concept of human dignity is used in contemporary human rights practice, in particular for protecting human rights of the poor in international, regional and national courts and quasi-judicial bodies?

The special workshop will continue discussions initiated in special workshops on the theme of poverty, social justice and human rights organized at the IVR World Congresses in Belo Horizonte (2013), Washington, D.C. (2015), and Lisbon (2017). The special workshop is open to all interested participants. If you would like to take part, please, contact the organizers of the special workshop as soon as possible.

Abstracts (750 words) should be submitted to the organizers by December 15, 2018. The deadline for submission of full papers is May 31, 2019. Submissions should be sent to: Gottfried Schweiger (gottfried.schweiger@sbg.ac.at) and Elena Pribytkova (ep2665@columbia.edu)

---