Publication Details

Abstract

The aim of the paper is to explain the normative ambivalent interconnection between civil rights and economic rights based on the example of people with disabilities. The article starts with the reference to two competing ideals of freedom in the human rights agenda, and the two meanings of the lack of free- dom: while the libertarian normative ideal of lack of freedom means coercion by man (F. W. Hayek), the egalitarian liberal understanding of unfreedom is extended to the lack of public capacity to acquire the personal ability to lead autonomous life and to the lack of opportunities to put these abilities into practice. In this case the original meaning of freedom is based on the interpretation of egalitarian dignity as formulated by Kant for the first time. Based on this normative ideal, the study further extends it to Tugendhatʼs concept of practical autonomy as a socially acquired ability and opportunity to lead an independent life, in the contrast to the one-sided dependency on impersonal, structurally given conditions of life. What practical autonomy in the case of disabled persons demonstrates, is the connection between practical autonomy, human dignity and equal rights, which implies redistribution of public resources for help to self-help. This redistribution does not seem to be in conflict with the rest of human rights, with the serious exception of the right of property. The fate of the human rights agenda, democracy generally, depends on the resolvability of the fundamental conflict between the right of property and the right to live in dignity.