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Definition of Disability

Terminology is an important and often sensitive issue in the field of disability and development. In everyday language, the preferred terms are: persons with disabilities, people with disability, and people with disabilities. The term "impairment" should be used sparingly and only under exceptional circumstances.
In terms of definitions, the IDB has not adopted an "official definition" or did not come up with a definition specific to IDB.  However, the following represent the most accepted definitions currently promoted by GLAD, a disability NGO in the United Kingdom for inclusion in the draft Disabled People' Rights and Freedoms Bill:
(http://www.glad.org.uk/Pages/rightsnow.htm).

Disability:  the interaction between a person with an impairment or health condition and the negative barriers of the environment (including attitudes and beliefs, etc.)  
Disabled person/people: a person or people (group of individuals) with an impairment or health condition who encounters disability or is perceived to be disabled.
Impairment:  a characteristic and condition of an individuals' body or mind which unsupported has limited, does limit or will limit that individual's personal or social functioning in comparison with someone who has not got that characteristic or condition. Impairment relates to a physical, intellectual, mental or sensory condition; as such it is largely an individual issue. Accordingly, disability is the way(s) in which people with impairments are excluded or discriminated against; as such, it is largely a social and development issue. People with impairments are people with specific conditions; disabled people are people with impairments who are excluded or discriminated against due to environmental factors.

The current international guide is the WHO discussion and classification within ICF: International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health. This complex classification considers the following aspects when trying to define a person who has a disability:

• Body functions are the physiological functions of body systems (including psychological functions).
• Body structures are anatomical parts of the body such as organs, limbs and their components.
• Impairments are problem in body function and structure such as significant deviation or loss.

Activities and Participation: Activity is the execution of a task or action by an individual. Participation is involvement in a life situation. Activity limitations are difficulties an individual may have in executing activities. Participation restrictions are problems an individual may experience in involvement in life situations. Environmental Factors make up the physical, social and attitudinal environment in which people live and conduct their lives.

Good Practice in Disability

A. Good practices of disability in social development have the following components:

• Empowerment

“Confidence that they can make a difference and that they can improve their lives”

-- Empowerment produces a paradigm shift, which leads social change

-- Empowerment increases human capital 

• Sustainable

“Progress that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”

Three dimensions: economic sustainability (self-sufficient), environmental sustainability, and social sustainability

• Social model-oriented as opposed to medical model-oriented

Social model explains that disability is a relationship with the society, and does not reside in persons with disabilities. Disability is the result of the interaction among environment, society and economic relations.

Example: using a wheelchair is not a disability, but the impossibility to go to school due to inaccessible building design is a disability.  

The medical model looks at impairments and tries to "normalize" persons; but the social model stresses the need to adapt society and question the ideal of "normalcy".

• Stakeholder-centered

Stakeholders hold power in decision-making and practice administration system.  People with disabilities are the ones who make decisions for their preference.

Also known as ‘self-determination’ and ‘consumer-control’.

• Promotes an inclusive/integrative/mainstream approach

People with disabilities should not be a targeted group. They are members of the mainstream society. In education, the words ‘inclusion’ ‘integration’ and ‘mainstream’ are used differently.  The goal is inclusive education for all.

• Replicable

“Able to transfer the model to different communities”

Has strategic planning, monitoring and accountable evaluation

B. Good practices of disability in social development preferably have these components

• Cross-disability, gender, race, class, age …etc

Should be a program operated regardless of difference in disability type, gender, race, class, age, …etc

• Affirmative Action (including non-discriminatory approach and protection of human rights)

Affirmative action is a set of positive steps aimed to promote equal opportunities and to eliminate discrimination. Affirmative action means inclusion.

• Collaboration/partnership/network with other civil society (e.g. NGOs), state (government) and market (e.g. business corporations)

Expands social safety net beyond family and their communities

• Community- Based Rehabilitation

CBR may be defined, according to three United Nation Agencies, ILO, UNESCO, and the WHO, as a "strategy within community development for the rehabilitation, equalization of opportunities, and social integration of all people with disabilities. CBR is implemented through the combined efforts of disabled people themselves, their families and communities, and the appropriate health, education, vocational and social services" (WHO, 1994) Click here for a more complete description.

• Advocacy

“Ability to make an impact on policy-level dialogue”. Strictly speaking, an advocate is “One who pleads, intercedes, or speaks for, or in behalf of, another; a pleader, intercessor, defender.” (Oxford Dictionary)  

• Awareness building

Limited knowledge and experiences on disability often create stereotypes and prejudices, which discourage society to include all kind of persons. Awareness is a tool to open people’s mind and guide for establishing policies with positive impact. Increases knowledge on the different aspects of disability

• Poverty Consideration

Poverty is hunger, lack of shelter, being sick and not being able to see a doctor. Poverty is not having access to school and not knowing how to read. Poverty is not having a job, is fear for the future, living one day at a time. Poverty is losing a child to illness brought about by unclean water. Poverty is powerlessness, lack of representation and freedom. About 1.1 billion people - one fifth of the world's population - live on less than $1 a day.

To know what helps to reduce poverty, what works and what does not, what changes over time, poverty has to be defined, measured, and studied -- and even experienced. As poverty has many dimensions, it has to be looked at through a variety of indicators -- levels of income and consumption, social indicators, and indicators of vulnerability to risks and of socio/political access.

Much work has been done using consumption or income-based measures of poverty, but also on non-income dimensions of poverty, most notably in the Human Development Report prepared annually by the United Nations Development Programme.

A common method used to measure poverty is based on incomes or consumption levels. A person is considered poor if his or her consumption or income level falls below some minimum level necessary to meet basic needs. This minimum level is usually called the "poverty line". What is necessary to satisfy basic needs varies across time and societies. Therefore, poverty lines vary in time and place, and each country uses lines which are appropriate to its level of development, societal norms and values.

Information on consumption and income is obtained through sample surveys, with which households are asked to answer detailed questions on their spending habits and sources of income. Such surveys are conducted more or less regularly in most countries. These sample survey data collection methods are increasingly being complemented by participatory methods, where people are asked what their basic needs are and what poverty means for them. Interestingly, new research shows a high degree of concordance between poverty lines based on objective and subjective assessments of needs.

For details on methodology, see the Measuring Poverty topic in the Poverty Analysis site. For data see Data and Data Sources.

• Millennium Development Goals (MDGs)

The uneven progress of development is worrying. The flows of trade and capital that integrate the global economy may bring benefits to millions, but poverty and suffering persist.
Responding to such concerns, governments and international development agencies have begun to reexamine the way they operate. In September 2000, 189 countries signed the Millennium Declaration, which led to the adoption of the
Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

The MDGs are a set of eight goals for which 18 numerical targets have been set and over 40 quantifiable indicators have been identified. The goals are:

• Eradicate extreme poverty and hunger
• Achieve universal primary education 
• Promote gender equality and empower women
• Reduce child mortality
• Improve maternal health
• Combat HIV/AIDS, malaria, and other diseases
• Ensure environmental sustainability
• Develop a global partnership for development.

While each goal is important in its own right, they should be viewed together as they are mutually reinforcing. Achieving them will require building capacity for effective, democratic, and accountable governance, protection of human rights, and respect for the rule of law.

Social Exclusion

"Social exclusion is "the inability of an individual to participate in the basic political, economic and social functioning of the society in which she lives" (Tsakloghu and Papadopoulos, 2001). Or more concisely, it is "the denial of equal access to opportunities imposed by certain groups of society upon others" (Behrman, Gaviria and Székely, 2003). The first definition gives the range of behaviors affected by exclusion, showing its multidimensionality. The second points to what perhaps are the two most distinguishing features of exclusion: that it affects culturally defined groups and that it is embedded in social interaction." [1]

The Latin American and Caribbean region is one of the most unequal in the developing world. It is a region where income, opportunity, and resources systematically and disproportionately accrue to only certain, more elite segments of the population. For many years, the poverty and social degradation that results from the region’s inequality was considered largely an economic problem. In just the last few years, greater attention and analysis is being paid to a more complex set of social, economic, and cultural practices that comprise "social exclusion", in which certain populations are excluded from the benefits of social and economic development based on their race, gender, ethnicity, or disabilities. Social exclusion in Latin America and the Caribbean affects predominantly indigenous peoples, afro-descendents, women, the disabled, and those living with HIV/AIDS.

Social exclusion affects an individual’s opportunity to find good work, decent housing, adequate health care, quality education, safe and secure living conditions as well as their treatment by the legal and criminal justice systems. A working definition of social exclusion is: a chronic scarcity of opportunities and access to basic and quality services, labor markets and credit, physical conditions and adequate infrastructure, and the judicial system. The complex problem of social exclusion appears to be intensified and more severe for individuals that belong to multiple excluded groups. For example, educational and job opportunities are more limited for indigenous women than indigenous men. Discrimination and racism can occur on multiple levels for the same individual. For example, a black intravenous drug user infected with HIV/AIDS can face racial and legal discrimination, prohibited from access to health care based on presumed criminal behavior.

As social exclusion so severely restricts access to the services and jobs needed for a minimal standard of living, there is a high correlation between poverty and social exclusion. Even when they are not the majority of the poor, the excluded typically constitute the poorest. These telling trends make clear that poverty reduction in the region will not be successful without also addressing the complex determinants of social exclusion.

Ironically, the "excluded" are not small segments of the population in Latin America and the Caribbean. In a number of countries with high indigenous or afro-descendent populations they can actually constitute the majority. Afro-descendents are often considered among the most "invisible" among the invisible. They are nearly absent among national political, economic and educational leadership. Despite their invisibility, preliminary estimates put the afro-descendent population at a surprising 30% of the region’s population with the largest concentrations in Brazil, Colombia, Venezuela, and Haiti. The data and estimates on the size of the Afro-descendent population in the region vary widely in how the population is defined, when the estimates were made, and the quality of the surveys carried out. Even given the methodological difficulties, it is clear that the concentration of poverty and reduced access to services among Afro-descendent populations is striking. For example, more than 80% of the Afro-Colombian population lives in extreme poverty and have annual incomes per capital of between $500-$600, three times below the national average of $1500.

Indigenous peoples also comprise substantial numbers. Overall, there are approximately 40 million persons of indigenous origin in Latin America and the Caribbean, 10% of the total population in region, but they comprise more than 25% of the total poor. In Brazil, Perú, Bolivia, and Guatemala, ethnic groups (indigenous and afro-descendent groups) constitute the majority of the population and 60% of the poor.

It is estimated that 1.8 million people are living with HIV/AIDS in Latin America and the Caribbean (UNAIDS, 2001). Women account for between 14 to 45% of all persons with HIV/AIDS. The relationship between HIV/AIDS and ethnicity is also strong in the region. The Garifuna in Honduras, a black/indigenous population, has one the highest HIV/AIDS prevalence rates in the region. In any given country, approximately 5 – 15% of the population is estimated to be physically disabled. The physical barriers to the inclusion of persons with disabilities are omnipresent in the region. Research from the region shows that the disabled have lower levels of educational achievement and are less likely to be employed than the non-disabled.

The challenges to gender equality cut across all the affected socially marginalized populations. The gains that women in the region have seen in schooling, women’s health, and the earnings gap between males and females have largely not accrued to those women in marginalized populations. In Guatemala, the salaries of indigenous women are 36% less than the salaries of non-indigenous women. Indigenous women get less schooling in Guatemala compared to their non-indigenous female counterparts. Within the disabled community, disabled women have less schooling and labor market participation than do disabled men.

The benefits of more active policies to promote social inclusion are many. A recent IDB study estimated the gains to the gross domestic product (GDP) on a per country basis if labor discrimination were eliminated among afro-descendent and indigenous populations. The findings were dramatic. Under these conditions, the Bolivian economy would expand by 36.7%, Brazil by 12.8%, Guatemala by 13.6% and Peru by 4.2%. These benefits to reducing discrimination do not include the improvements in social cohesion, community integration, educational performance, among many, that also result from greater inclusion. Multilateral institutions such as the IDB, seek to work with countries and organizations to advance economic, social, and individual development in the region by fostering social inclusion. [2]

• Inclusive Development

Inclusive Development refers to the formulation and implementation of policies, plans, programs, projects and actions for the human and socioeconomic development, which ensure and make feasible the ideal of equal opportunities and the exercise of rights -civil, political, economic, social and cultural-- for every person, regardless of his/her social status, gender, physical or mental condition and ethnic filiation.

Inclusive development increases the scope of the rights and abilities of each dimension of human beings (economic, social, political, cultural) within both diversity and specificity, based in equity and the provision of equal opportunities for every member of society.

Considering as a point of departure the relationship between disability and production, a scenario where the principles of inclusive development are applied would generate the conditions for every person to develop their abilities, according to their condition, and integrate in the productive process, previously modifying the physical and cultural context in order to make them accessible, considering that universal design represents the better formula. Likewise, efforts could be oriented to promote equal opportunities to eradicate every form of discrimination and exclusion.

A key component of a society oriented by inclusive development is the solidarity with those who cannot incorporate in productive activities according to the standard conditions of access to education and labor market.   

In short, the concept of inclusive development includes [3] :

1. Gives a value to the contribution of every human being in the development process.
2. Considers the human being the subject and main beneficiary of development.
3. Does not discriminate, acknowledges the importance of differences, appreciates diversity and transforms it in an advantage, a chance and a rigth.
4. It aims at equality: it is guided by the principles of equity and justice.
5. Fights poverty and gives priority to the more disadvantaged groups.

§         Social Development

There is no consensus on the scope of the term “social development.” For the purpose of this document, social development comprises investments in human and social capital for advancing people’s well being. It includes actions in health and nutrition, education, housing and labor markets, which expand individual capabilities and opportunities, as well as actions in promoting social inclusion and combating social skills, which enrich the social fabric needed for human development.

Source: Social Development Strategy IDB-SDS PUBLICATIONS

http://www.iadb.org/sds/SOC/publication/publication_58_3237_e.htm

Terminology

Terminology [4]

[1] Buvinic, Mayra, Mazza Jacqueline with Ruthane Dutch (eds.)  Social Inclusion and Economic Development in Latin America, Washington, DC : Published by the Inter-American Development Bank : Distributed by the Johns Hopkins University Press, 2004.

[2] http://www.iadb.org/sds/SOC/publication/publication_73_665_e.htm

[3] Ibid.

[4]Source: ESCAP “Using Correct Terminology”
http://www.unescap.org/decade/terminology.htm) with minor revisions.