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With contributions from distinguished authors in 14 countries across 5 continents, this book provides a unique transnational perspective on intellectual disability in the twentieth century. Each chapter outlines different policies and practices, and details real-life accounts from those living with intellectual disabilities to illustrate their impact of policies and practices on these people and their families.
Bringing together accounts of how intellectual disability was viewed, managed and experienced in countries across the globe, the book examines the origins and nature of contemporary attitudes, policy and practice and sheds light on the challenges of implementing the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCPRD).
67 FOUR Intellectual disability in twentieth-century Ghana Jane Abraham and Auberon Jaleel Odoom Ghana, a country in West Africa with a current population of just under 30 million, was a British colony until 1957 (previously called the Gold Coast), when it became the first colony in sub-Saharan Africa to regain its independence. Prior to independence, Britain, as the colonial power, extracted natural resources – gold, diamonds, timber and cocoa. Britain built railways and transport systems to assist resource extraction. A few Western-style hospitals and
ELEVEN Disability: prospects for social inclusion Carol Thomas Introduction Disability was a topic of interest to Peter Townsend from the earliest days in his academic and policy-oriented career. From the 1960s onwards he recognised that disability was always present somewhere in the mix that sculpted poverty and socioeconomic disadvantage in communities – especially among old people and in families with disabled children. His long-standing interest in social conditions, social relationships and the unequal distribution of resources meant that social
99 SIX Intellectual disability in Hong Kong: then and now Phyllis King Shui Wong Introduction This chapter explores policy and practice in Hong Kong, and their impact on people with intellectual disabilities and their families, in three phases: before the 1990s (‘Early developments’); pre- and post- resuming sovereignty over Hong Kong (‘The Golden Era’); and from the Millennium to the present (‘Divergence’). Before the 1990s: Early developments Laura’s story I: A parent’s experience Laura, the mother of a 43-year-old daughter with Down’s Syndrome, said: “I
177 ELEVEN Intellectual disability policy and practice in twentieth- century United Kingdom Simon Jarrett and Jan Walmsley This chapter attempts an overview of the dense and complex history of intellectual disability in the United Kingdom in the twentieth century. Inevitably much of it focuses on legislation and policy emanating from the dominant Westminster parliament and its civil service apparatus. For the first half of the century, we concentrate on the legislative and policy environment in England and Wales, and for the second, mainly on England
9 Ethnicity, disability and chronic illness Simon Dyson and Maria Berghs Overview This chapter will help readers to understand how patterns of disablement and chronic illness may partly derive from levels of material deprivation. It also: • illustrates the value of looking at the interactions not only between ethnicity and disablement, but also between other factors such as age, gender and socioeconomic status; and • shows why it is important to interpret official figures on disability and ethnicity with care, and how cultural explanations from a policy
98 Benefits Number 43 • Volume 13 • Issue 2 Disability: rights, work and security Marilyn Howard Disability is a complex and contested issue, often with tensions between policy approaches of ‘benefits’ and ‘rights’, that is, benefits as compensation for exclusion rather than civil rights to enable inclusion (Daniel, 1998). These intersect with different models of disability (medical, social and transactional: Howard, 2003). Traditionally, the medical model has been the ‘moral basis’ for benefits (SSAC, 1997), although increasingly the social model is accepted
41 THREE Sickness and disability reform in the Netherlands In their original design, welfare states were set up to protect workers of the industrial age by providing risk-pooling social insurances for risks encountered in the social system of production: unemployment, disability and the need for a pension during old age. European welfare states, after recovering from the Great Depression and World War II, expanded these policies as their economies thrived and employment expanded, allowing a generous welfare state response to social risks. But generous
79 FIVE A Greek Neverland: the history of the Leros asylums’ inmates with intellectual disability (1958–95) Danae Karydaki All children, except one, grow up. Barrie, 1911, 3 Introduction On 10 September 1989, a Greek scandal made headlines in the British Observer newspaper; the article’s title was ‘Europe’s Guilty Secret’ and the front page depicted several naked male mental patients looking desperate, wandering around the Leros Psychiatric Hospital buildings in Lepida. The piece described the appalling living conditions under which the patients struggled
21 ONE Paradoxical lives: intellectual disability policy and practice in twentieth-century Australia Lee-Ann Monk Introduction In 1911, in a paper read at the Australasian Medical Congress, Melbourne doctor J.W.Y. Fishbourne urged Australia to implement policies to remedy ‘the problem of the feeble-minded’. In failing to act, he asserted, the nation was lagging behind international opinion: ‘The United States of America recognise the danger and England is beginning to waken up to the seriousness of the problem’. To prove his point, he cited evidence from
