Chapter 5 proposes an interpretation of Article 12 that allows for decision-making by substitutes as a last resort through relocating personhood from recognition of autonomy to recognition of dignity. It settles on a concept of dignity as inherent, as a legal principle (not a right) that underpins human rights and the CRPD, and as having five dimensions. The first dimension recognises the equal worth or value of all human beings. The second recognises autonomy as an important component of dignity for people who have autonomy but seeks to position autonomy as only one very valuable good amongst others. The third recognises dignity as reflexive and acknowledging the interdependent, interpersonal and social nature of being human. The fourth recognises personhood as embodied and particular, thereby acknowledging the residual impacts of impairment and the materiality of our lives. The fifth dimension demands an understanding of rights as interdependent and indivisible.

This chapter sets out the case for studying cleaners’ dignity at work. It starts with a description of my arrival at Potsdamer Platz, of the cleaners and the corporate underworld. The overarching question concerning what happens to cleaners’ dignity in social interactions is developed, and the book’s central notion of “dramas of dignity” is introduced. The chapter ends with an overview of the subsequent chapters.

Notions of a person’s ‘worth’ were socially created, This chapter looks for the notions of worth involved in the multifarious everyday transactions between people. As so much depended on others, peasant farmers could not afford to trust anyone who was not of good reputation. Fair dealing and the common good were important in the moral economy of working life not because transactions between neighbours were altruistic, nor even necessarily friendly, but because they were essential. Tenth century laws regulating the hundred built on a moral economy which valued good reputation and personal knowledge and in which co-operation mattered. Courts came to collective decisions, sworn oaths established truth and standing surety for another person meant that personal knowledge of the accused was essential. The witness of neighbours was vital when it came to questions of land: boundary clauses from the ninth and tenth century were based on detailed knowledge which only local people could provide. Peasant farmers became more formally part of the financial system when heregeld began to be levied.

Honour was an important and enduring element in the moral economy and mattered as much to peasants as to the nobility. ‘Honour’ retained something of the Old English notion of weorđ , entitlement. Association with a lord or estate owner could bestow weorđ but so too could ownership of a full ploughteam. Local saints were often people who were valued for what their piety could achieve for the community. Age could command respect: ‘village elders’ and ealdormann , both have ‘elder’ as their root. Peasant elites also became consolidated as a result of the countryside becoming formally organised from the mid-tenth century for the purposes of dealing with local matters, mainly crime and its policing. Townships were the political worlds of the peasantry and the sphere in which peasant elites operated. A strong emphasis was put on inheritance, a value shared across society.