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The concept of human dignity is closely tied to the idea of self-esteem. According to Avishai Margalit a „decent society‟ is characterized especially by its social institutions that perceive citizens as self-determined subjects of their own actions and not as objects of external decisions. Self-esteem means in this sense understanding the fact that the personal interests must be seen by the others as appropriate and of the same value. This central theme is closely connected to the modern republican concept of freedom as non-domination. If this concept is related to the configuration of the market economy and to the eradication of poverty, then we come to the idea of socio-economic civic rights, which protect the citizens' status from arbitrary interference by the state or the market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]