Advocacy for Inclusion

"providing individual and systemic advocacy to improve life for people who have a disability"

Information Sheet

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People Will Thrive Best When The Fullness Of Community Is Available To Them

Advocacy for Inclusion firmly believes in an inclusive society that provides opportunities and support for all people to participate. Communities are made better when they encourage and value the contributions of all members. All members gain from the benefits of a strong, supportive, inclusive community.

The value of full community life is wonderfully expressed in this quote from Michael Kendrick:

“People with disabilities have continuously found themselves at the edges of community life more than in the main flow of it. This has been helped by our pattern of organized segregation… Some people even claim that people with disabilities are “meant” to be apart... However, we have been lucky enough to see that this setting apart is not at all necessary, and that people with disabilities do just fine in the community… and the community is inevitably enriched by respectful contact with those they used to shun.”

“What is greatly “life-giving” is when people see that community life is where “life” is at its fullest and people with disabilities ought to be deeply embedded in it, as might suit them as individuals, and enjoying its benefits. This need not mean that people expect that “community life” is somehow without its own sufferings and limitations. Rather, no matter what the harshness of community life, people with disabilities ought to be living amongst their fellow human beings and sharing the hardships along with the virtues of life in any community. It also means that one is not done with the process when one is physically present in communities. There still remains the question of whether one is socially part of communities and, more importantly, whether one occupies valued social roles or is left to languish within community in oppressive and devalued social roles.” 1

Some Problems With Congregate Living

Group Homes

While people who live in group homes are to all appearances living in the community there are many reasons why group homes deny people access to the fullness of community life.

Congregation = Segregation

Group homes provide people who have a disability with the services they need to live in the community by putting a number of people in one house so that they can share support staff. While this has benefits in terms of costs, it also means that people who have a disability are seen as different and set apart from the community, much as they were when institutions were the preferred living option. Therefore it can be said that congregation of people who have a disability into group homes leads to their segregation from the community.

Rigid Routines Stifle Growth

In a group home people are expected to shop and eat together and very often to recreate together. Rituals and routines are developed to help things run smoothly but these routines reduce individual choice. Group homes limit the full expression of a person’s wants and needs and in many cases lower expectations in terms of behaviour and life skills. Individual growth and development is suppressed in order to have an efficiently running house.

The Individual Not as Important as the Group

In group homes people are expected to live for many years with three or more people with whom they may have nothing in common. They are expected to cope and behave "appropriately" in this living situation no matter what differences and falling out they may have with other people living there. Sharing can be very difficult for any adults living together who have to share facilities in a house. The ability to exercise individual decision making is also severely limited because the needs of the group come first.

Poor Examples for Modelling Behaviour

Support staff are often stressed and overworked, unable or unwilling to implement policy guidelines about appropriate behaviour and therefore not successful as good role models for the people they support. Individuals in group homes must often compete for the limited time of the support staff; negative attention seeking behaviours are commonly learnt from other residents of the group home.

No Access to the Fullness of Community Life

Access to community life is often limited, as outings must be organised so that all members of the household can participate. As it is difficult for staff to arrange them, outings are often based on activities within a “disability community” rather than experience of, and inclusion in, the community in general.

“The problems described above can lead to people becoming unhappy with their living environment. Because they have no control of the situation they will look for ways to express their discontent. Such expressions of discontent are usually labelled as behaviour problems” 2

1. Kendrick, 2001 in “The Empowering Value of “Life-Giving” Assumptions About People”
2. Van Dam, Wunsch & Hugill, 1998 in ‘Challenging Institutions’

   Resources:
   ‘Challenging Institutions: Community Living for People With Ongoing Needs’ A Coalition Against Segregated Living Publication www.infoxchange.net.au/AMIDA, 2000.
   Michael Kendrick, “The Empowering Value of “Life-Giving” Assumptions About People”, Opening Keynote Presentation For the Congress “Crossing Boundaries” (“Over Grenzen”), Hosted By Stitchting Perspectief, Wageningen, Netherlands, September 12-15, 2001. Harriet Zeigler, ‘Changing Lives, Changing Communities’ Research and Advocacy Unit, Wesley Central Mission, 1992.

"working with people who have a disability, families, friends and others for a more inclusive society"