Hello Michael, Mike, Erik and others who have contributed to the SRV social
model debate, here goes my bit -
Some of the differences being discussed between the social model and SRV are
very evident if you look at the underlying discourses. These do seem to
connect with the people that were involved in formulating the ideas and with
the actions that they propose in relation to impairment and disability.
SRV is formulated around ideas of psychology, Parsonian social roles and
Goffman's concept of stigma. However, by encapsulating subjectivities from
earlier times into social roles, and using these as a basis to understand
the actions of people with a disability, SRV may well have preserved the
earlier medical and psychological discourses that it set out to overcome.
I think the lack of 'voice' is relevant to this discussion in a lack of
narrative about self-identity. Giddens argues that a person’s identity is
not equivalent with their behaviour, but is constituted through their
narrative. Within the SRV framework, the social roles (eternal child, object
of ridicule etc.) pre-determine the framework for the interpretation of the
actions and narratives of people who have a disability.
The social model is built more upon a neo Marxist or a critical framework
and as such, views disability as socially constructed by capitalist or
materialist forces. A collective identity of resistance to these forces is
much more evident (and not without its own problems for people who have an
intellectual disability).
Although SRV and normalisation models offer more access to rights and
choices than the previous custodial ways of thinking, they do not offer the
power to exercise these rights and choices. This remains in the hands of
professionals who decide if the choice is in the best interests of the
person with an intellectual disability, according to their (the
professionals) interpretation of valued social roles.
The 'what to do about disability' question is answered very differently -
SRV focuses mainly on the individual, getting them into a socially valued
role, avoiding other devalued persons, working on skill development. The
social model is more concerned with structural change and access issues and
collective actions. There are lots of ways that social models and SRV do
converge in practice, the reasoning for getting there is just different. I
propose a social relational model of disability as being most useful
(Thomas, 1999). This thinking does allow for the limitations of bodies (this
includes brains) to be recognised in 'impairment effects' and for the
psychological effects of disabling practices to be also recognised but it
does not lose the collective stance of the social model like SRV does.
cheers Anna Williamson
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