Human Dignity as a Value - Prof. Aharon Barak

Based on Prof. Barak's fundamental book on human dignity (Human Dignity: The Constitutional Value and the Constitutional Right), this lecture aimed to establish human dignity as a constitutional value, while exemplifying the normative role it plays. In that regard, the lecture presented human dignity as a factor that ensures the normative unity of human rights, which is expressed in three ways: First, as a normative basis for constitutional rights in the constitution; second, as an interpretative principle for determining the scope of constitutional rights, including the right to human dignity; third, as having an important function in determining the proportionality of a statute limiting a constitutional right

Human Dignity as a Constitutional Right - Prof. Aharon Barak

To better clarify the status and scope of human dignity as a constitutional right, this session delved into Prof. Barak's general theory of constitutional rights and the key concept of proportionality. Human dignity does not embody but a "bundle of rights", quite the contrary; it is the independent standing of human dignity that births many daughter rights into the judicial system. Considering the equal scope of the constitutional right and value of human dignity, a sub-constitutional solution, namely a proportional statute, must follow in case of collision of rights. According to the theory, and as appose to the American judiciary, a collision of constitutional rights does not result in one trumping or shrinking the other, for on a constitutional level, we may "let a thousand flowers bloom".