HFRS Code of Practice on the Employment of People with Disabilities

What does the "social model" of disability mean?

There are two different ways of explaining what causes disadvantage to people with a disability:

an individual (or medical) model of disability, and
a social model of disability

The individual or medical model is interpreted as a person’s inability to join in society is seen as a direct result of having an impairment and not as the result of features of our society which can be changed. When policy and decision makers think about disability in this individual way they tend to concentrate their efforts on 'compensating' people with impairments for what is 'wrong' with their bodies by targeting 'special' benefits at them and providing segregated 'special' services for them and so on.

The Disability Discrimination Act is based on what is known as the ‘Social Model of Disability.’ The Social Model is based on the understanding that the disadvantage and social exclusion is not the inevitable result of a person’s impairment, but rather stems from attitudinal and environmental barriers. The social model disability is shown to disable people who have impairments because the way it has been set up and excludes people from taking part in every day life.

It follows that if people with disabilities are to be able to join in mainstream society, the way society is organised must be changed. Removing the barriers which exclude (disable) people who have impairments can bring about this change.

Barriers can be:

Prejudice and stereotypes
Inflexible organisational procedures and practices
Inaccessible information
Inaccessible buildings
Inaccessible transport
Management practices
Work organisation

These barriers have nothing to do with individual’s disabled body - they are created by people which mean it is possible to remove them.