The Value of Human Dignity in the Refugee Protection

Abstract

This article seeks to illuminate the significance and importance of human dignity in the evolution of the legal protection of refugees and asylum-seekers at international, continental and national level. Human dignity “as a value and a right“ plays an important role in the interpretation of the rights as outlined in the South African Bill of Rights and the various laws and policies that give effect to them. The article demonstrates how human dignity contributed (and still contributes) to the advancement of South Africa's refugee regime, whose main objective is to ensure that refugees and asylum-seekers are afforded access to their constitutional rights. A further objective is ensuring that refugees and asylum-seekers are afforded the kind of treatment that is consistent with global and constitutional standards of dignity, which inform the ethics of refugee reception and treatment.