What is important in the disability experience is knowing that you are not alone. There are thousands of persons with disabilities thinking similar thoughts, having similar experiences, and getting angry. We are not alone. We have a history.

Within the community of disabled persons in this country there is a division between those concerned with civil rights and those concerned with service delivery. On the one hand, there is the Independent Living Movement which is a necessary fact of life for disabled persons in this country today, whether or not they require the services of an Independent Living center. There is also the Disability Rights Movement which is a necessary for disabled persons in this country today, whether or not they face civil rights violations. Although there is an overlapping membership, persons who identify with the Independent Living Movement are concerned with the provision of services to disabled individuals in order to make them truly independent.

Public lecture on behalf of Strathclyde Centre
for disability research and Glasgow City Council

by Mike Oliver,
Professor of Disability Studies University
of Greenwich 27 April 1999

Pretoria, South Africa - Innovative Disabled Entrepreneur Award Scheme (IDEAS) is a Ntsika Enterprise Promotion Agency competition for successful disabled Small, Medium and Micro Enterprises.

IDEAS seeks to affirm and give recognition to entrepreneurs with disabilities who have demonstrated excellence and innovation as well as triumph over adversities in their business enterprises.

Entry forms with requirements to be collected at the Provincial SMME/Disability Desk. People eligible for the competition are:

Seminar on Human Rights for Persons with Disabilities
from a North and South Perspective
Stockholm, Sweden 23 August, 1998

Jerry Nkeli, Human Rights Commissioner, South Africa

På svenska

WASHINGTON (1999) --The National Council on Disability (NCD) has released a groundbreaking report documenting ineffective enforcement of the Air Carrier Access Act (ACAA) since the law's passage in 1986. NCD's report, Enforcing the Civil Rights of Air Travelers with Disabilities, contains recommendations on how to improve the enforcement of civil rights of air travelers with disabilities, including changes to the law and improvements for the Department of Transportation.

På svenska

The following article appeared in DISABILITY INTERNATIONAL; Asia-Pacific Region, Vol.11, No. 2 1999. Disabled Peoples' International. 

On 17-20 May, 1998, the first Independent Living seminar in Seoul, Korea was conducted jointly by the Chung Nip polio Center in Korea and Human Care Association of Japan.

by Yukiko Nakanishi
President, Asia Disability Institute, Chairperson, DPI-Japan International Committee

A popular Japanese expression says that "A women has no house to rest in anytime", meaning that a woman should obey her father as a child, her husband as a wife, and her children as an elderly person. In Japan, as elsewhere in Asia, women continue to be treated as substantially inferior to men.

The problems of women with disabilities are especially more intensive than those of women without disabilities. The issues and problems facing women with disabilities are numerous as all of you are already aware. Poverty and injustice are cores of vulnerability and deprivation of women with disabilities.

"Legislation for Human Rights"

Stockholm, Sweden, 24 August 1998

by Dr. Federico Montero

Background

Gesetz über Unterstützung und Dienstleistungen für gewisse
Funktionsbehinderte und das Gesetz über Fürsorgeleistungen

Ministerium für Gesundheit und Soziales
Internationales Sekretariat

Postanschrift:
S-103 33 Stockholm
Schweden

September 1993

Inhalt

Das Gesetz über Unterstützung und Dienstleistungen für gewisse Funktionsbehinderte (SFS 1993: 387)

Das Gesetz über Fürsorgeleistungen (SFS 1993: 389)

Presentation at the ENIL Seminar in Southampton March 9, 2003

by Ann Macfarlane MBE

Older People & Legislation on Assessment & Direct Payments, Summary of the legal provisions,
by Ann Macfarlane MBE, March 2003

“Sometimes, I have to skip having a bath in order to chase my dreams.”

Introduction

Keynote at the Expert Seminar
organized by the Hampshire Center for Independent Living
in Southampton, May 30 -31 1998

by Philip Mason

I am privileged and overawed to be the first speaker in this conference. A conference which is looking at the future in respect of those well known phrases 'Independent Living' and 'Direct Payments'. It is a privilege and also a responsibility because I need to strike the right note. I need to encourage but also to challenge.

So where do we start? Do we talk about the past; look at the present, and then think about the future?

We ought to do a little bit of all three and it is my job to start the ball rolling.

by Kathy Martinez, with the assistance of Barbara Duncan
Reprinted form Disability World, A bimonthly web-zine of international disability news and views,
Issue no. 20 September-October 2003

Background

In September 1997, leaders from Maine State government, business, education, and the non-profit community gathered for the Conference, Maximizing Economic Potential.  They set out to explore how Maine can develop the information technologies the state needs to be globally competitive. Sponsored by the Maine CITE Coordinating Center and the Maine Department of Education, the Conference looked at how government and education can lead the way in ensuring that information technologies accommodate differing needs and provide access for everyone. This report is the outcome of that effort.

Read also:

• Disability Community Leaders Denounce Jack Kevorkian, by Paul Longmore
• "A serial killer of disabled people, out on the streets" - by Diane Coleman
• Protest letters against legalizing physician-assisted suicide

Colleagues:

The movement of disabled Americans has entered its second phase. The first phase has been a quest for disability rights, for equal access and equal opportunity, for inclusion. The second phase is a quest for collective identity. Even as the unfinished work of the first phase continues, the task in the second phase is to explore or to create a disability culture.

This historic juncture offers a moment for reflection and assessment. It is an opportunity to consider the aims and achievements of the disability movement over the past generation and in the last few years.

In August 1985, The Disability Rag reported an incident that captured the essence of the disability movement's first phase:

Labor Day weekend radio event
to benefit Literacy Volunteers of America (Sept. 5, 1999)

On the 12 of March 2000, the World NGO Summit on Disability, in Beijing, People's Republic of China, adopted a resolution regarding an international convention on the rights of all disabled people.

The full text of the Resolution follows:

We, the leaders of Disabled Peoples' International, Inclusion International, Rehabilitation International, the World Blind Union, and the World Federation of the Deaf, as well as national non-governmental organizations (NGO's) of and for people with disabilities from all continents, have convened in Beijing from 10 - 12 March 2000 to develop a new-century strategy for the full participation and equality of people with disabilities.

Telekom - firande inför kvinnodagen

av Ms. Fadila Lagadien

In English

by Ms. Fadila Lagadien
First published in the IDT magazine - Leading Edge, 1996

It is the accepted belief that as disabled people we cannot engage in gainful or meaningful employment as we are believed to be sick. Sick people belong in hospital! For this reason, disabled people are placed in sheltered employment to KEEP THEM BUSY. I would like to challenge the existing perception by providing an alternative viewpoint.

In my opinion the major reason for the non-participation of disabled people in society, particularly in the workplace, is that we live in a barrier-infested society!

by Fadila Lagadien, 1993

To understand potential one needs to clearly understand or have a vision of what or with whom one is dealing. For example, to understand a dog's potential, one needs to know what a dog is, what it can and cannot do.

The same would apply to any human being including people with disabilities. Unfortunately, our society have negative stereotypes about people with disabilities. This shadows society's ability to focus on the capabilities of the person as they focus only on what the person cannot do. For this reason I would like to give a world wide accepted definition of "Disability" and "Handicap" as is defined by the WORLD HEALTH ORGANIZATION - GENEVA -1980.

Dear Friends,

As the consequence of my meeting with Director General of Bangkok Mass Transit Authority (BMTA) yesterday, the inauguration of Thailand First Accessibility Bus Lines will occur on August 5, 1999 at 09.00 AM.

Mr. Sonthaya Khunplum Dept. Minister of Transportation & Communication will preside over the first launching of service. Hundreds of persons with disabilites including 30 wheelchair users will witness the ceremony. You can get update news at www.bangkokpost.net on August 6, 1999. The schedule for the launch of this service is as follows:

08.30

The Office of Women's Health in the Department of Health and Human Services (DHHS) announces the first-ever federal resource center for women with disabilities as part of the expanding National Women's Health Information Center (NWHIC). NWHIC serves as a single gateway to thousands of federal and private sector publications and organizations on women's health through its Web site (http://www.4woman.gov) and toll-free information number (1-800-994WOMAN).

Report of the CIB Expert Seminar on Building Non-Handicapping Environments, Budapest 1991

Contents

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Design guidelines of public collective housing for the aging society:
The move toward a new era in Japan

Satoshi Kose, Building Design and Use Division, Building Research Institute, Tsukuba, Japan