Human Dignity / Human Rights in the Early Modern Period
Both the concept of human dignity and that of human rights form a central point of reference for philosophical, ethical, legal, historical and political treatments of normative legitimacy. Most contemporary readings are linked to the concept of human dignity which Kant developed through an amalgamation of Stoic, Christian, humanist and Enlightenment traditions. The stylization of the ‘modern’ era as an epochal watershed, which can be observed in parts of the research landscape, not only transfigures the Enlightenment as concentrated on Kant but also denies the historicity, i.e. the spatiotemporally situated character, of the emergence of normative concepts.
In co-operation with History and Philosophy, the project ‘Human Dignity / Human Rights in the Early Modern Period’ explores the precursors of these concepts in the history of ideas, especially in the context of the response within Spanish scholasticism to the colonial experience of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and examines their systematic contribution to human rights debates.
The School of Salamanca is distinguished by the fact that it was confronted with a universal global system of political domination. The Spanish-Habsburg monarchy reached the limits of its claim to sovereignty both at its periphery and at its centre. The relationship between national monarchies and the church was called into question and the rights of individuals within these communities and outside of them were likewise threatened. The theorists of Spanish second scholasticism grasped the close interconnections between these issues.
Across the religious and confessional divides similar patterns of argument can be found in the European debates within the estate assemblies, which appeal to the justificatory schema of the right of emergency and defence (natural law, Roman law, ancient custom), but also to conscience as a controversial political-theological concept. That religion cannot be imposed by force was a point of conflict in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries and a relevant argument within all the European political systems, though also towards the colonial populations. It represents the ferment within which the modern concept of human rights developed.
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People in this project:
- Project director / contact
- Lutz-Bachmann, Matthias, Prof. Dr. | Profile
- Schorn-Schütte, Luise, Prof. Dr. | Profile
- Project members
Publications of this project:
- Bunge, Kirstin (i.E.): "Ordnung und Freiheit. Zum Begriff der Freiheit und des Rechts bei Francisco de Vitoria und Bartolomé de Las Casas", in: Kirstin Bunge, Stefan Schweighöfer, Anselm Spindler, Andreas Wagner (Hrsg.), Kontroversen um das Recht. Beiträge zur Rechtsbegründung von Vitoria bis Suárez. Stuttgart: frommann-holzboog.
Details - Bunge, Kirstin (forthcoming): "Francisco de Vitoria", in: Wörterbuch der Würde, hrsg. v. Rolf Gröschner, Antje Kapust, Oliver Lembcke. München/Stuttgart: Fink-UTB, 2012.
Details - Bunge, Kirstin (2011): "Das Verhältnis von universaler Rechtsgemeinschaft und partikularen politischen Gemeinwesen. Zum Verständnis des totus orbis bei Francisco de Vitoria", S. 201-227, in: Kirstin Bunge, Anselm Spindler u. Andreas Wagner (Hrsg.), Die Normativität des Rechts bei Francisco de Vitoria. Stuttgart: frommann-holzboog.
Details - Lutz-Bachmann, Matthias; Fidora, Alexander (2010): Kognitive Ordnungen in der Philosophie des Mittelalters, in: WBG Weltgeschichte, Bd. 3, Darmstadt.
Details - Lutz-Bachmann, Matthias; Niederberger, Andreas (Hrsg.) (2009): Krieg und Frieden im Prozess der Globalisierung, Velbrück Verlag, Weilerswist 2009
Details - Ptaszynski, Maciej (2008): „Was für große sorge und mühe ein heiliger ehestandt wehre“ (Pfarrwitwe 1599. Zur Lebenssituation der Pfarrwitwen am Ende des 16. und Anfang des 17. Jahrhunderts?, in: Thomas Kaufmann, Kaspar von Greyerz (Hg.), Konfessionen und Kulturen in der Frühen Neuzeit, Heidelberg 2008, S. 319-346.
Details - Schorn-Schütte, Luise (Hrsg.) (2009): Die Sprache des Politischen in actu. Zum Verhältnis von politischem Handeln und politischer Sprache von der Antike bis ins 20. Jahrhundert (Schriften zur politischen Kommunikation 1), Göttingen 2009.
Details - Schorn-Schütte, Luise (2009): Politische Kommunikation als Forschungsfeld. Einleitende Bemerkungen, in: dies. (Hg.), Die Sprache des Politischen in actu. Zum Verhältnis von politischem Handeln und politischer Sprache von der Antike bis ins 20. Jahrhundert (Schriften zur politischen Kommunikation 1), Göttingen 2009, S. 7-18.
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