Implications of dignity for international development highlighted at major conference

Dr Séverine Deneulin , Senior Lecturer in International Development within our Centre for Development Studies, was a major contributor at the second international Human Dignity and Human Development Conference hosted by the University of Notre Dame's Kellogg Institute for International Studies , Indiana (US). The conference is part of a multi-year research initiative investigating the role of human dignity in the practice of international development. During her contributions, Dr Deneulin, of our Department of Social & Policy Sciences , related the importance of human dignity to development. "The Sustainable Development Goals can be tools for helping us to express solidarity," she said. "But, they remain tools. Human Dignity ought to remain always as an end." At the conference, development practitioners and scholars examined the implications of human dignity for development theory and practice, considering whether human dignity can serve as a common connector among predominant development frameworks, including the capability, wellbeing, and happiness approaches. "Approaching human development from the perspective of human dignity serves as a locus across differences that might otherwise be intractable in the global environment," said Kellogg Institute Director and legal scholar Paolo Carozza, who leads the initiative.