Government Implementation of the Standard Rules
As Seen By Member Organizations of
World Federation of the Deaf - WFD

Download 'WFD Reports on the UN Standard Rules' as a PDF file (240 KB)

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The Independent Living Institute wishes to express gratitude to Mr. Bengt Lindqvist, UN Special Rapporteur, and Mr. Dimitris Michailakis, for their kind permission to print the previously un-published WFD reply to the Implementation of the Standard Rules.

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© Dimitris Michailakis 1997

Read the Standard Rules Implementation of the Standard Rules as seen by: Governments | DPI | ILSMH | RI | WBU

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Contents

Part I - Summary

Introduction.
General policy.
Legislation.
Accessibility.
Organizations of persons with disabilities.
Co-ordination of work.
Conclusion.

Part II - NGO Replies

Industrialized countries

Australian Association of the Deaf, Australia.
Österreichischer Gehörlosenbund, Austria.
Deutscher Gehörlosen-bund E.V., Germany.
Greek Federation of the Deaf, Greece.
Deaf Association of New Zealand, New Zealand.
Norges Döveforbund, Norway.
Swedish National Association of the Deaf, Sweden.
National Association of the Deaf, USA.

Middle East and North Africa

Association of the Deaf, Egypt.

Countries in transition

The Hungarian National Association of the Deaf, Hungary.
Latvian Association of the Deaf, Latvia.
Polish Association of the Deaf, Poland.
Byelorussian Association of the Deaf, Republic of Belarus.
Slovak Union of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, Slovak Republic.
Ukraine Society of the Deaf, Central Board (USD CB), Ukraine .

Latin America and the Caribbean

National Association of the Deaf, Belize.
National Federation of the Deaf, Brazil.
WFD, Costa Rica.
Federacion Venezolana de Sordos, Venezuela.

Sub-Saharan Africa

Association Nationale des Sourds du Benin, Benin.
Association Nationale des Deficients Auditif du Burkina Faso, Burkina Faso.
The Gambia Association of the Deaf and Hard of Hearing, Gambia.
Association Nationale des Sourds de Cote d'Ivoire, Ivory Coast.
Kenya National Association of the Deaf, Kenya.
Deaf Federation of South Africa (DEAFSA), South Africa.
Swaziland National Association of the Deaf, Swaziland.
Association des Sourds du Togo, Togo.
Association Nationale des Sourds du Zaire, Zaire.
Association of the Deaf, Zimbabwe .

South, East Asia and the Pacific

Macau Deaf Association, Macau.
Organization of the Deaf, Malaysia.

Introduction

This report analyses the replies to the questionnaire sent not only to the governments of the UN Member States, but also to 600 national NGOís within the disability field. The number of responses from the NGOís was not as high as from the governments of the Member States, representing, however, a very interesting material. In this report I will separate, among the total of 163 replies from NGOís, the 31 replies from World Federation of the Deaf (WFD).

Part I of this report presents and analyses the results from the NGOís belonging to WFD, which have answered the questionnaire. Each table corresponds to a specific question in the questionnaire (the number of the question is marked). For each question, after the presentation of the results, comparisons are made between a) the results from the organization in question and the results from the total of NGOís responding to the questionnaire, and b) the results from the organization in question and the replies from the governments. In this way we can locate issues where convergence, or divergence, of views exists, between the particular NGOís and all the NGOís having responded to the questionnaire, and between the particular NGOís and the governments.

The information in Part II is presented in rather a detailed form, in order to expose the collected data of the responding NGOís.

The decision to send the questionnaire not only to governments of the Member States, but also to NGOís within the disability field proved to be worthwhile. The different perspectives and views indicate a more complex picture of the degree of achievement of each country as to the implementing of the Standard Rules. When the government and one, or many, NGOís give the same answers there is a guarantee for the reliability of the received data, but when, on the other hand, the answers differ many questions arise. For instance: Who knows what about whom? Does the organization for the blind know the conditions for the mentally disabled? Is there a trend that governments give an idealizing description, while NGOís give a pessimistic one? The comparisons in this report are not aiming at indicating the greatest possible differences, but at finding the greatest possible achievements with the standards, set out by the Rules. Yet, attention has to be paid to cases where the answers from one and the same country are not concordant. For several questions, the difference between the percentages reported by WFD organizations and governments is ten percent or more. What do such differences tell us?

The answers differ, now and then, on specific details on very essential issues, like what kind of services that are available, and what persons with disabilities are entitled to. That the answers differ, on issues such as the role of the co-ordinating committee, is rather evident, since it is a question of assessing, of evaluating a process between two or more parties. But in case of divergent answers about social and economic rights questions arise. Is there an information gap even among the most prominent spokesmen for persons with disabilities? Do organizations have too small resources in order to keep themselves well-informed? Or do the disability organizations work rather separately from each other; concentrating on their own, specific disability group, due to the complexity of the matter, that is ¥disability¥ is it a too big an issue to keep record of?

The divergence is of course in many cases the result of a different perspective due to different roles: The government is the actor implementing policies within a wide range of issues, while NGOís are experts in a specific field, actors who therefore very well know what is happening in a limited area. The answer from the NGO can thus sometimes be the verification, or falsification, of the answer from the government. The government answer giving a more optimistic view than the answer from the NGOís could depend on the fact that - being the responsible part for the implementation of policies, conventions and rules, such as the Standard Rules - the government wants to demonstrate that it has carried out its obligations.

By elaborating the specific replies of different NGOís, comparing the answers with the NGOís as a whole - a rather common procedure - and with the governments, one trait has emerged, rather unexpectedly: that specific NGOís diverge on one or many issues with the NGOís in general but converge with the answer from the government. In order to explain this, and other interesting findings, further monitoring is needed.


Distribution of NGOs belonging to WFD, according to regions
(compare these results with reports from: Governments | DPI | ILSMH | RI | WBU)

Regions	Frequency	Percent
South, East Asia and the Pacific	2	6,5
Industrialized countries	8	25,8
Latin America and the Caribbean	4	12,9
The Middle East and North Africa	1	3,2
Sub-Saharan Africa	10	32,3
Countries in transition	6	19,4
Total	31	100,0

Answers from WFD organizations came from all regions. The region with the highest rate of responses is the Sub-Saharan Africa, followed by the industrialized countries. The Middle East and North Africa as well as South, East Asia and the Pacific are the regions with the lowest rates of responses.

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Contents of the WFD Report