De la deshumanización a la rehumanización (El reto de volver a ser persona)

Abstract

If dehumanization is identified with loss of the meaning of life, it is possible to conclude that recovering the meaning of life coincides with a rehumanization process. To understand this dialectic drive or force of opposites, the authors illustrate the phenomenon of dehumanization of modern man at two paradigmatic moments in the twentieth century: the violence that caused human destruction in world wars during the first half of that century, and the addictions that caused existential slavery, in the second half. Based on both these dehumanizing catastrophes, the authors conclude that the greatest challenge facing the twenty-first century is to portray or explain the phenomenon of rehumanization as a promising task for the reconstruction of those who have been dehumanized.