Abstract

Liberalism has been under attack of late as lacking the conceptual foundations to support its political edifice. The central concepts of liberalism, namely liberty and equality, are supposedly incompatible. Thus liberalism is purportedly incapable of generating a coherent political theory that pays due regard to both of these central notions. ;This thesis argues that there is another important concept within the liberal lexicon, namely human dignity, which underlies appeals to both liberty and equality. Indeed, the concept of human dignity informs our most important political theories, both liberal and conservative. In understanding the nature of the concept of human dignity, then, we will better understand the relationship between liberty and equality. ;The concept of human dignity, it is argued, arises at the interface of morality and aesthetics. Hence appeals to the notion have both moral and aesthetic dimensions. The analysis offered here endeavors to examine the nature of such appeals, by distinguishing initially between the moral useage via a conception of basic human dignity, and its aesthetic counterpart in terms of a notion of personal dignity, arguing eventually that liberalism alone is capable of meeting the moral demands while sustaining the aesthetic appeal of this important concept