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What is self-determination?
• having one’s personal autonomy or independence respected,
• having the opportunity to develop plans for the future and to act upon them,
• having access to the social, cultural, economic and political opportunities of one’s community that help to define a person’s possibilities, and
• the right of individuals to determine the choices in their lifestyles
What’s the Difference?
• Independence
• Dependence
• Interdependence
From Medical Welfare Model to Human Rights Model
Recognizes non-discrimination and equality rather than good-will as the goals of the liberation and inclusion struggle.
Recognizes disability as a state of being rather than a tragic deviation from “normalcy.”
Accepts empowerment and self-direction as key to achieving equality and citizenship
Some Recent Reflections on the Meaning of Self-determination
• self-determination is a new way of handling public funds
• self-determination is a way to reduce the costs of services
• self-determination is a set of skills • self-determination is a way for people to get
publicly funded support• self-determination is a name for a social
movement • self-determination is a new point on the
continuum of services
Care and Support
• Care involves looking after someone; while support is to use recipient-determined help to enable someone to accomplish the choices they make themselves
Differences in Meaning• Care Services
• Deliverer-determined• Best interests• Paternalism• Predictability• Disempowerment• Carer control• Fixing weakness• Categorization• Minority share-holder• Charity
• Support Environment• Recipient-requested• Choice• Self-determination• Unpredictability• Empowerment• Self-advocate control• Developing strengths• Individual need• Majority share-holder• Rights [email protected]
Supporting People
• What is sought in assisting disabled people in the community can only become viable when services are constructed which are in essence concerned with supporting disabled people to realize their personal aspirations.
Freedom
• Freedom is the empowered individual’s right to make choices not within the narrow confines of externally defined limitations but within the full range of possibilities and within their own understanding of what well-being means to them.
• Empowerment is the freedom of choice
Definitions of Health
• Health (WHO Constitution of 1948): a state of complete physical, social and mental well-being, and not merely the absence of disease or infirmity
• Health Promotion: the process of enabling people to increase control over, and to improve their health
• Health for All: the attainment by all the people of the world of a level of health that will permit them to lead a socially and economically useful life
Disability Adjusted Life Years
• “a unit for measuring both the global burden of disease and the effectiveness of health intervention.”
(World Bank Report, 1993)
A Human Rights FrameworkRecognizes that:Disability is a result of social, legal and economic
statusA broad set of factors contribute to exclusion and the
loss of human rights
Respect for diversity contributes to well-being
People must be supported to exercise their rights
People need a sense of fairness in their communities and societies
“It is justice, not charity, that is wanting in the world”
Mary Wollstonecraft, UNDP Report, 1994)
