Two Conceptions of Dignity: Honour and Self-Determination

In Bernardo Bertolucci’s film The Last Emperor (1987), Pu Yi, the last of the Qing emperors is ‘re-educated’ by the Communist regime through having to share a prison cell with his former servant, making his own bed and working at menial tasks. The valet endures enormous conflict as he is ‘liberated’ from the role of servant while still clinging to that very role. Although the film may be unreliable as history, it is enlightening on the topic of dignity. Pu Yi has been brought up to behave with the kind of dignity and demeanour of one who controls a vast empire, yet he is treated by a succession of manipulators as little more than a puppet to be used for political ends of which he is often unconscious. He is repeatedly shamed as it becomes clear that he has no real power over his own life. The valet has spent his life in thrall to his master, yet is re-educated to take a new view of himself and the master as equals. While the dignity of Pu Yi is reduced by the people who imprison him, the valet’s is enlarged. Here we see some of the multiform nature of dignity: it seems to be something an individual can possess, cultivate, and feel. Yet it also seems to be at the disposal of others, to give or take away from us.