Review | Disability Praxis

Disability Praxis covers some of today’s key debates on disability justice in Britain and the US. rs21 member Shiraz Hussain reviews. 

Disability Praxis, by Bob Williams-Findlay, was published by Pluto Press in November 2023, and is available here.

In this book, Bob Williams-Findlay sets out to explore disability politics within the context of its history and aims to signpost towards ideas which have the potential to develop a new disability praxis. The stated approach is historical materialist. There are references throughout to Gramsci’s ideas on cultural hegemony and to Paulo Freire’s ‘pedagogy of the oppressed’. The focus is mainly on the history of disability politics in Britain with some references to the USA – disability politics in other countries is not covered.

The author identifies four cornerstones of disability politics in Britain – the fundamental principles of disability, the self-organisation of disabled people, self-determination and self-directed living, and disability culture and identity.

The fundamental principles of disability

The central idea under this heading, shared by many quoted writers in the field of disability studies, is the distinction between impairment – a physical difference in the person which negatively affects their functioning – and disability, which is defined here in terms of social exclusion suffered by the person with the impairment. This is the social model of disability. A consequence of framing disability in this way is that what is referred to as the ‘personal tragedy’ view of disability is rejected.

This framing of disability raises questions – while it is certainly true that prejudice against people with impairments is at the root of their exclusion and needs to be collectively challenged, does it follow from this that the disabled person’s feelings about their disability are to be set aside and not expressed?

As feminism has taught us, the interrogation of personal experience leads to political understanding. An example of this is the experience of persistent anxiety, the gnawing dread of terrible outcomes which the sufferer cannot avert. This could be framed psychologically as ‘anxiety neurosis’ a problem in the individual requiring therapeutic intervention, or socially as a problem with disempowerment (how many billionaires suffer persistent anxiety?). A socialist looking at this personal experience would be very likely to take the second approach.

The consequence of this devaluing of personal experience shows itself in the following sentence on page 134: ‘the spectrum of the ‘politics of disability’ within campaigning is evident, with bloggers discussing their own personal angst caused by benefit reforms for example.’ What is being described here is the justified fear (not personal angst) that disabled benefit claimants feel at the prospect of benefit cuts (not benefit reforms). Fear arising from disempowerment is an integral part of the experience of any member of a marginalised and persecuted group.

The definition of disability in terms of the social exclusion of people with impairments also seems problematic. If there were no social exclusion on the grounds of disability, would we refer to the people previously described as ‘disabled people’ as “impaired people”? A disabled friend with whom I discussed this said that while she had no objection to being described as a disabled person, she would take strong exception to being called an ‘impaired’ person. The reason for the objection clearly lies in the connotation of ‘impaired’ – a near synonym for ‘defective’, being applied to a human being and the horrific consequences of this in recent history.

An alternative would be to define impairment as the physical fact underlying disability, and disability as the social difficulty experienced as a result. This would allow differentiation between problems caused by the impairment – a wheelchair user has limited mobility – and problems caused by discrimination against the disabled person – a venue failing to provide access ramps for wheelchair users.

The self-organisation of disabled people

Organisations of disabled people should be run by disabled people. This breaks with earlier organisations for disabled people which were run by medical and other professionals. Where disabled people run their own organisations their common purpose will engender solidarity and lead to empowerment. On the other hand this solidarity can be undermined by political differences within the membership which will lead to disagreement on what is to be done.

There is further discussion cited under this heading over whether disability politics is or is not a social movement and whether or not disability politics fits under the heading of identity politics. Given the number of differing opinions quoted it is understandable that no definite conclusion is reached.

The chapter discussing this heading closes with the author stating that it is questionable whether we can still speak of a Disabled People’s Movement due to a lack of internal agreement.

Self-determination and self-directed living

This idea comes to the fore as a result of the move from disabled people living in institutions to disabled people living in the community.

Examples from independent living movements in the USA and Britain are discussed, along with the question of the dichotomy between independence and integration.

Although discussed here in the context of the historical move from institutional living to living in the community, the question of disabled people, particularly those dependent on benefits, having some control over how they live their lives remains highly relevant.

Arguably, the problems of institutional living do not arise from the fact of a disabled person living in an institution, but rather from a culture that treats institutionalised disabled people as less than other people.

The targeting of disabled benefit claimants, who at the time of writing are being threatened both with impoverishment and a removal of autonomy, shows the same prejudice at work, and I would have liked to see this discussed under this heading.

Disability culture and identity

There is a strong emphasis here on the importance of disabled people having a shared culture and identity, how disabled people are to think of themselves.

This comes naturally from a view of disability as a form of social exclusion suffered by people with impairments. If disability is a form of oppression, then it makes sense for all disabled people to have a common culture and to identify as disabled in order to combat the oppression.

Hence there is an emphasis on the importance of people with impairments accepting disability as an essential part of their identity. But if disability is defined in terms of social exclusion, what would happen to the identity of these people once they were no longer excluded?

There are two other difficulties with the view that disabled people need to embrace a disabled identity which unifies them in order to combat their exclusion. Firstly it overlooks the different experiences of people with different disabilities – how much commonality is there between the life of a healthy deaf person and the life of a person left unable to work by long-term illness? Secondly, seeking parity between disabled and non-disabled people overlooks the problem of class – how likely is it that a wheelchair-user who owns a portfolio of rental properties and a wheelchair-user who is dependent on benefits will make common cause?

This book discusses many disabled people’s organisations which have come and gone, and goes into a lot of detail on how disability is to be conceptualised, but does not deal with current struggles. The plight of disabled benefit claimants is only spoken of in a couple of brief references, while no mention at all is made of the long-term sick, arguably the most severely excluded group among disabled people, whose inability to generate a profit for an employer puts them in the crosshairs of populist politicians and the right-wing media.

In summary, the author has done an impressive amount of work in providing a detailed overview of the development of disability studies and the contribution of ideas from the field to the praxis of disabled people’s movements in Britain and the USA. However, what is missing is an analysis of the intersection between disability and class. I would argue that such an analysis is essential to a successful challenge to the oppression of disabled people under capitalism.