Balancing AI Power and Human Dignity: Law and Governance

Abstract

Artificial intelligence (AI) is reshaping human society on a previously unimaginable scale, but its rapid deployment has exposed a profound conflict between algorithmic optimization and human dignity. This article examines how AI systems, designed to optimize speed, scale, and profit, keep colliding with fundamental rights such as equality, privacy, and due process. By case law analysis, legislative provisions, and international documents, it identifies key risks such as algorithmic bias, bulk surveillance, and the lack of transparency in automated decision-making. The argument also examines upcoming governance approaches, from the EU AI act to the UNESCO recommendation and advocates a human-rights-based approach to regulation. In the end, the article’s conclusion is that technology innovation and dignity need to be balanced by enforceable legal systems, vigilant judiciaries, and international collaboration in order to provide assurance that AI is serving humankind and not eroding it.

Introduction

AI has evolved quickly from a specialized technology tool to a force of transformation governing almost every aspect of social, economic, and political life. From predictive policing to algorithmic hiring, from tailored healthcare to algorithmic trading, AI systems now make or guide choices previously the province of human judgment. As promising as these technologies are regarding efficiency and innovation, they also present essential threats to the dignity of the human person. The challenge, therefore, is not so much to regulate AI as a neutral technology, but to confront how its use transforms values, freedoms, and rights that are central to constitutional and human rights regimes.

Human dignity lies at stake here. Inscribed in charters such as the UDHR and the majority of national constitutions, dignity preserves the idea that all human persons possess inherent worth and must never be reduced to being treated as a means to an end.[1] Algorithmic systems do exactly that, however, by reducing individuals to data and probabilistic predictions, and thereby threatening to erode this foundational good.

This article argues that the power of algorithms must be balanced with human dignity through an integrated legal and ethical approach. There are four sections to this article. Part I addresses algorithmic bias and discrimination and how neutral systems can spread injustice. Part II addresses surveillance, privacy, and autonomy and whether AI deprioritizes conditions of human freedom. Part III turns to labor and economic dignity, analyzing automation’s impact on work and livelihoods. Part IV considers the role of law, ethics, and governance in protecting dignity, with attention to constitutional principles and recent global developments. The article concludes that only through principled, rights-based regulation grounded in dignity as a guiding star can societies harness AI’s benefits while avoiding its dehumanizing potential.

Algorithmic bias and discrimination: invisible injustices

Clearly, one of the most significant challenges facing AI today is bias and discrimination built into artificial intelligence systems. Algorithms are often touted as neutral, objective tools, but in reality, they carry the biases, assumptions, and structural inequalities that result from training data.[2] In certain sensitive sectors say, criminal justice, employment, or credit scoring – the potentially biased outputs may take on a magnifying and amplifying quality.

One salient example is the United States case of State v Loomis (2016), in which a defendant challenged the inclusion of COMPAS a risk-assessment algorithmic tool in his sentencing process.[3] It produced a “high risk” score, which formed part of the evidence on which the judge ultimately based his decision, but its methodology was proprietary and opaque. The Wisconsin Supreme Court allowed its use but with acknowledgement of concerns that such reliance may violate due process and fairness. This example, therefore, illustrates how automated decision making affects fundamental rights without sufficient transparency and accountability behind it.

Similar dilemmas are posed in connection to employment algorithms. Reputation for having dropped the AI tool it had created for hiring purposes permeated Amazon. The algorithm apparently discriminated against women, due to the male-dominant historical data collection in the industry.[4] The EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) directly addresses issues like these since Article 22 grants individuals the right “not to be subject to a decision based solely on automated processing, including profiling, which produces legal effects concerning them or similarly significantly affects them.”[5]

Such academic research might stress that the structures in which these algorithms operate give rise to algorithmic bias. For example, Ruha Benjamin uses the construct of “New Jim Code” to advance how digital systems can place themselves in the service of a progressific façade while reproducing racial hierarchies.[6] Hence, Safiya Noble uses Algorithms of Oppression to show how search engines marginally capture women and minorities.[7] By putting it that way, they emphasize that overcoming bias involves more than just fixing technical problems; it requires investigation into ethical and legal characteristics incorporated in AI artifacts.

This principle of equality here demands vigilance. For instance, Article 14 of the Indian Constitution guarantees equality before the law, which has so far been interpreted by courts as a bulwark against arbitrariness.[8] Biased use of AI systems by state actors could lead to a violation of constitutional guarantees to equality. The proposed AI Act of the EU, too, classifies the systems in hiring, credit scoring, and policing as “high risk” and lays out the requirement for strict compliance assessments to ensure that there are no discriminatory results.[9]

Algorithmic bias is, then, not merely a technical issue but rather one of constitutional and human rights. Without careful regulating, it stands to end institutionalized injustice on a grand scale, while dignity is undermined by reducing persons to flawed statistical categories.

Surveillance, Privacy, and Autonomy: AI and the Erosion of Freedom

The fading of autonomy peripherally may result from bias and the AI-enabled surveillance system. The line between security and control is often blurred as nations and corporations apply pervasive facial recognition, biometrics, and predictive analytics.

The European Court of Human Rights has reiterated that privacy is important for dignity and autonomy. In Lopez Ribalda v. Spain (2019), the Court found that covert surveillance did violate Article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights.[10] The Court also found in Digital Rights Ireland (2014) that the Data Retention Directive was an unjustified interference with the right to privacy.[11] The above-mentioned instances represent a climate in which technology-assisted surveillance is challenged side by side with fundamental rights.

In the United States, Carpenter v. United States (2018) marked the watershed moment where the Supreme Court held that accessing historical cell-site location data constituted a Fourth Amendment search.[12] The ruling seeks to amend the growing tendency that digital data collection entails, even from private persons, on the individual liberty of the citizenry.

Yet this rationale provided insufficient deterrence against AI surveillance proliferation. The greatest expression of this is surely the all-encompassing algorithmic monitoring of citizens through the Social Credit System in China, with a calculated effect on their travel, jobs, and education.[13] Though largely characterized as an authoritarian regime, with various forms of data-driven governance from predictive policing in the United States to smart city surveillance in Europe.

What remains ethically troubling is the maintenance of a balance whereby technological ease does not begin the erosion of all processes to achieve meaningful autonomy. Privacy scholars like Daniel Solove posit that surveillance chills self-expression, erodes trust, and ultimately undermines democracy. [14] The United Nations Human Rights Committee also stated that privacy, in the sense of Article 17 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, is necessary for dignity.[15]

Constitutional protections show inconsistencies from jurisdiction to jurisdiction. The U.S. Constitution does not have an explicit section for the right to privacy; rather, it only implicitly safeguards privacy using the Fourth Amendment. On the other hand, privacy is recognized as a completely separate right by the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights.[16] This stark contrast makes transnational governance critical, with mechanisms such as the OECD AI Principles and UNESCO’s 2021 Recommendation on AI Ethics.[17]

The last stand, AI surveillance places a risk that citizens may terribly be turned into things of control. Algorithmic monitoring lacks checks and balances, undermining not only an individual’s right to privacy but also a democratic society’s collective autonomy.

Labor, Automations, and the Question of Economic Dignity

The advent of AI also threatens the dignity of labour. Automation offers the promise of efficiency, but its boundless spread threatens millions of jobs, particularly in the routine and low-skilled sectors. According to the International Labour Organization, the threat of AI concentration of wealth into the hands of the select few that control technology would act to skew inequality further.[18]

However, economic dignity goes beyond wages. It consists of dignity stemming from being recognized, able to participate and secure in one’s ministry of work to society. Philosophers ranging from Hannah Arendt to Martha Nussbaum argue that dignified labour lies at the heart of human flourishing.[19] To the extent to which AI reduces human workers to disposable inputs, it undermines that moral core.

Examples are concrete; the gig economy algorithmically managed by tools administered by platforms such as Uber or Deliveroo who dictate the scheduling of shifts, monitor performance, and allocate pay, typically acting in total absence of transparency and appeal.[20] This “digital Taylorism” threatens worker autonomy, thus subjecting them to what some scholars dub “algorithmic domination.”[21] Courts have started to respond; a landmark judgment in 2021 by the UK Supreme Court Uber BV v Aslam stated that drivers are workers and entitled to labor protections, challenging the view of independent contracting.[22]

At the constitutional level, labor rights are often articulated as socio-economic rights. Article 23 of the UDHR safeguards the right to work under just and favorable conditions, while Article 41 of the Ethiopian Constitution recognizes the right to engage in freely chosen labor.[23] AI-driven displacement and precarious gig work must therefore be assessed in light of these guarantees.

Governments are experimenting with different options for intervention. The draft AI Act from the European Commission contains provisions on transparency in the workplace. Along the same lines, the U.S. Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights (2022) emphasizes workers’ rights to transparency and freedom from algorithmic harm.[24] Yet there is still debate on the adequacy of these frameworks. Some propose stronger redistribution strategies through taxation of AI multimillionaires; while others think of universal basic income as a cushion against displacement.[25]

Safeguarding economic dignity will require something more than safety nets. It must, in fact, entail measures actively aimed at ensuring that AI actually acts as an ally to human work while maintaining the strength of workers themselves in determining their own technological environment.

Law, Ethics, and Governance: Towards a Dignity-Centered Framework

Bias, surveillance, and automation are the conditions, whilst governance endeavors to be the cure or the attempt at curing them. A disjointed but diverse world has responded to AI, and different jurisdictions have come up with experimental models. Across that diversity, the thread that brings it all together is the principle of human dignity.

The EU AI Act, adopted in the year 2024, is the broadest legal framework so far concerning regulation. This legislation classifies AI systems by risk categories; banning unacceptable systems (like social scoring); tightly controlling the “high-risk” ones; and a requirement of transparency for the rest.[26] Notably, the recitals make explicit mention of human dignity as a principle.

Meanwhile, the U.S. Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights offers principles such as “safe and effective systems,” protections against algorithmic discrimination, and data privacy.[27] Though not legally binding, it anticipates the turn toward rights-based governance. At the global level, UNESCO’s 2021 Recommendation on AI Ethics, which 193 states adopted, underscores respect for human dignity, human rights, and environmental sustainability.[28] the binding Treaty on AI and Human Rights was adopted by the Council of Europe in May 2024. This treaty requires member states to align their AI practices to the European Convention on Human Rights.[29]

The ethical frameworks are coalescing with those legal regimes. For instance, the IEEE’s Ethically Aligned Design initiative advocates incorporating values like transparency and accountability into AI systems.  However, critics invoke phrases like “ethics-washing” in reference to lofty principles for which no enforcement is in place.[30] This is why enforceable legal norms-backed by constitutional and international guarantees-remain indispensable.

The role of constitutional law is therefore critical. Time and again, the Federal Constitutional Court of Germany has confirmed that human dignity is inviolable according to Article 1 Basic Law.[31] Such case law goes well beyond the national core, but also generates wider European debates regarding technology governance. The same goes for South Africa’s Constitutional Court, which has interpreted dignity as being at the heart of rights, ensuring from privacy to labor, and model for other jurisdictions grappling with AI. [32]

Yet challenges remain. The ongoing reforms in enforcement gaps, jurisdictional fragmentation, and the speed of technological change threaten to outpace law. More than that, however, the pertinent question is whether the AI rules of the rich states would, in practice, become global standards by which lesser voices from the Global South may not enter. [33] Hence, the dignity-centered approach must sufficiently be inclusive in the sense that the governance framework reflects diversified cultural, social, and economic realities.

Way Forward

Looking ahead, protecting human dignity in the age of artificial intelligence requires more than technical fixes. Lawmakers should go beyond outdated privacy and anti-discrimination rules by creating clear standards for evaluating the social impact of algorithms and monitoring them for bias. This would ensure that progress does not come at the expense of fundamental rights. Courts can also play a vital role by treating unfair or opaque AI systems as violations of equality and due process. Recognizing the right to challenge automated decisions would send a strong signal that technology must remain accountable to the law. Civil society, including advocacy groups and researchers, must continue exposing harmful practices, supporting affected individuals, and pressing companies toward fairer systems. Public awareness is key, since people cannot defend rights, they do not understand. Finally, AI governance needs international cooperation. Frameworks like the EU AI Act and UNESCO’s ethical guidelines show how global standards can prevent weaker jurisdictions from becoming testing grounds for harmful systems. The way forward is clear: innovation must always respect human dignity.

Conclusion

AI has become a constitutional moment, not only a development. The hold of algorithms on power is so great: who will receive a loan; who has a job; who is being watched; who is punished. But principles will not apply to power, and that dehumanizes human beings.

Human dignity thus provides guidance through the frontier. It requires that persons not become data points, that privacy and autonomy must be respected, that work must hold meaning and value, and that governance must cater to human rather than machine needs. This does not urge rejecting AI; rather, placing it in a moral and legal framework prioritizing humanity.

Movement is possible, as shown by the EU AI Act, U.S. AI Bill of Rights, and the Council of Europe treaty. However, it is sharper vigilance that remains required. Balancing the power of algorithms with the dignity of humankind is not a one-off task but a continuing responsibility, constitutional and ethical, for the AI age.

Bibliography

Primary Sources

Cases

• State v Loomis 881 N.W.2d 749 (Wis 2016).
• Carpenter v United States 138 S. Ct. 2206 (2018).
• Aslam v Uber BV [2016] EW Misc B68 (ET).

Legislation & International Instruments

• Constitution of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, 1995.
• Constitution of India, 1950.
• European Union, Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council (General Data Protection Regulation) art 22.
• European Union, Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 laying down harmonized rules on artificial intelligence (Artificial Intelligence Act).
• UNESCO, Recommendation on the Ethics of Artificial Intelligence (UNESCO 2021).
• Council of Europe, Convention on Artificial Intelligence, Human Rights, Democracy and the Rule of Law (2024).
• The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights: Making Automated Systems Work for the American People (2022).

Secondary Sources

Books

• Ruha Benjamin, Race After Technology: Abolitionist Tools for the New Jim Code (Polity 2019).
• Kate Crawford, Atlas of AI: Power, Politics, and the Planetary Costs of Artificial Intelligence (Yale University Press 2021).
• Safiya Umoja Noble, Algorithms of Oppression: How Search Engines Reinforce Racism (NYU Press 2018).

Journal Articles

• Brent D Mittelstadt, Patrick Allo, Mariarosaria Taddeo, Sandra Wachter and Luciano Floridi, ‘The Ethics of Algorithms: Mapping the Debate’ (2016) Big Data & Society https://doi.org/10.1177/2053951716679679.

Reports

• International Labour Organization, The Impact of Artificial Intelligence on the World of Work (ILO 2021).

News & Media Articles

• Jeff Dastin, ‘Amazon Scraps Secret AI Recruiting Tool That Showed Bias Against Women’ Reuters (11 October 2018) https://www.reuters.com/article/us-amazon-com-jobs-automation-insight-idUSKCN1MK08G

[1] Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) art 1

[2] Kate Crawford, Atlas of AI: Power, Politics, and the Planetary Costs of Artificial Intelligence (Yale University Press 2021).

[3] State v Loomis 881 N.W.2d 749 (Wis 2016).

[4] Jeff Dastin, ‘Amazon Scraps Secret AI Recruiting Tool That Showed Bias Against Women’ Reuters (11 October 2018). https://www.reuters.com/article/us-amazon-com-jobs-automation-insight-idUSKCN1MK08G

[5] Regulation (EU) 2016/679 of the European Parliament and of the Council (General Data Protection Regulation) art 22

[6] Ruha Benjamin, Race After Technology: Abolitionist Tools for the New Jim Code (Polity 2019)

[7] Safiya Umoja Noble, Algorithms of Oppression: How Search Engines Reinforce Racism (NYU Press 2018).

[8] Constitution of India 1950 art 14.

[9] Regulation (EU) 2024/1689 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 13 June 2024 laying down harmonized rules on artificial intelligence (The AI Act)

[10] Lopez Ribalda v Spain (2019) 68 EHRR 29.

[11] Digital Rights Ireland Ltd v Minister for Communications (Joined Cases C-293/12 and C-594/12) EU:C:2014:238

[12] Carpenter v United States 138 S.Ct. 2206 (2018).

[13] Samantha Hoffman, ‘Programming China’s Social Credit System’ (2020) 45 Journal of Contemporary China 56

[14] Daniel Solove, Understanding Privacy (Harvard University Press 2008).

[15] Human Rights Committee, ‘General Comment No 16’ (1988) UN Doc HRI/GEN/1/Rev.9

[16] Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union [2012] OJ C326/391, arts 7–8.

[17] OECD, ‘Recommendation on AI’ (2019); UNESCO, ‘Recommendation on the Ethics of Artificial Intelligence’ (2021).

[18] International Labour Organization, The Future of Work in a Changing Natural Environment (2020).

[19] Martha Nussbaum, Creating Capabilities (Harvard University Press 2011).

[20] Jeremias Prassl, Humans as a Service (Oxford University Press 2018).

[21] Antonio Aloisi and Valerio De Stefano, ‘Essential Jobs, Remote Work, and Digital Surveillance’ (2020) 41 Comparative Labor Law & Policy Journal 123.

[22] Uber BV v Aslam [2021] UK SC 5.

[23] Constitution of the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia 1995, art 41

[24] The White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights: Making Automated Systems Work for the American People (4 October 2022) https://bidenwhitehouse.archives.gov/ostp/ai-bill-of-rights

[25] Erik Brynjolfsson and Andrew McAfee, The Second Machine Age (WW Norton 2014).

[26] EU AI Act (n 9) arts 5–7

[27] AI Bill of Rights (n 24).

[28] UNESCO, Recommendation on the Ethics of Artificial Intelligence (UNESCO, 2021).

[29] Council of Europe, Convention on Artificial Intelligence, Human Rights, Democracy and the Rule of Law (adopted May 2024)

[30] Karen Yeung, ‘Why Ethics Cannot Be the Answer to the Challenges of AI’ (2020) 20 Philosophy & Technology 1.

[31] German Basic Law 1949, art 1(1).

[32] Khosa v Minister of Social Development 2004 (6) SA 505 (CC).

[33] Abeba Birhane, ‘Algorithmic Colonization of Africa’ (2020) 2 Scripted 389