Conclusion: human dignity and the future of European democracy

Abstract

The contributions to this book have attempted to illuminate the impact of the democratic decay in Europe on the status quo of human dignity. In the individual parts of the book the authors investigated the relationship between democracy and dignity through the lenses of identity, citizenship and solidarity. All this has been impacted by ‘converging crises’, from the recent financial crisis and the ongoing migration crisis to the current, pandemicinduced health and economic crises. One of the research objectives behind the study of these interconnected concepts was to gauge how the retreat of liberal democracy eroded the ideal state Europe wanted to achieve after World War II. This was a state in which human dignity is the most important governing principle, a ‘cultural-anthropological premise’ of constitutional law, the basis of fundamental rights in European Union (EU) law, which places ‘a particular understanding of humanity at the foundation of post-war constitutionalism’. The other related question that arises in this respect, of course, is whether only liberal democracy can recognise dignity by guaranteeing rights on the basis of a universal recognition of citizens as morally equal.