Abstract

This chapter aims at exploring the way the human dignity is institutionalized in the Bulgarian legal system. The research is based on the analysis of the 1991 Bulgarian Constitution, the legislation, and the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court. The human dignity is analyzed with regard to both its nature as a legal standard and its content. A comparison between the constitutional concept of human dignity and its reflections in acts of the Parliament and in key decisions of the Constitutional Court is accomplished. Thus an observation is made that the shaping of the human dignity is done in divergent manner by the constitutional and the ordinary legislator and by the constitutional jurisdiction without the emerging “sector-specific” and “issue-specific” dignities to be unconstitutional. Finally several suggestions are made for the improvement of the constitutional institutionalization of the human dignity and for its putting into practice by the courts.