I soggetti vulnerabili: prospettive di tutela della persona

Vulnerability is the condition of people living a daily life of risks and uncertainties. Law should ensure protection in case of discrimination and should guarantee equal treatment. This essay aims at proposing an overview of the vulnerability’s legal conditions in order to address the contemporary issues with whom the rights of persons coexist. To this end, the rights of persons should be considered as fundamental rights which may become a source of integration — and, sometimes, of correction — of rules, even the contracting ones, in the administrative and judicial action. In this respect, the concept of vulnerability may serve as a heuristic criteria and a quality and quantity indicator and may be helping to understand issues and to find solutions geared to equal treatment and respect of the rights of persons in a promotion, and not just protection, perspective. Every person should have the chance to make his own choices and the opportunity to decide on his plan life, avoiding exclusion, marginalisation and stigmatisation which prevent self-determination and development of his personality. The citizen thus recovers the sense of his humanity in the “communities” of belonging.