Publication
Defining Dignity
Defining Dignity represents the modernization and the globalization of certain previous radical traditions of social justice, preserving their vision of social change, while updating their analysis, language and consequent prescription. The term ‘dignity’ forums like the World Dignity Forum can provide a new axis for a radical political and social mobilisation. This anthology is part and parcel of contemporary social and political activities of the Forum.
Defining Dignity has diverse expressions, Some expressions focus on a market-driven society that marginalizes a substantial number of the population, and the solutions proposed within the system advance only a series of walfare measures. Some other expressions focus on a more historical and systematic analysis of the causes of injustice and humiliation, in terms of caste, class, race, disability, gender and sexuality. There are expressions regarding the deficit of democracy, which pushes populations to exclusion. Expressions of religious minorities, occupied populations and unemployed labour go beyond many fixed categories of exclusions.
There are possibilities and tensions involved in the co-existence of these competing expressions. The tensions arise from the diverse ideologies and the different departure points. Further, the pluralities of the living worlds drive the discriminated people to create their own perceptions of necessity, justice and order. For example, development, modernity and globalization have contradictory implications, with no clear-cut homogeneity of connotations for the Indian Dalits. Traditional occupations and jobs, with which Dalits had previously been associated, had meant increasing oppression for them.
Thus, modernity and development are viewed by a number of Dalits as liberating forces. They are ways by which new opportunities in employment can be opened up that are more emancipatory and materially beneficial. Technological progress attracts the middle-class segments among the Dalits. English education is being considered empowering by many.
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