I am very glad that someone has rasied the issue of agency and
its application to the experience of disability, as well as
the place of neo Marxist theory within disability studies.
I have been spending some time thinking about that topic
lately. Here is my thinking (at a very early stage...)
The early versions of the materialist theory of disability
can be criticised for being overly-economistic. That is,
they suggested that the nature of responses to disability reflected
"the needs of capitalism". I think Finkelstein's
(1980) work can be criticised for this failure and I think
that some of Oliver's work can also be criticised in this
regard.
The problem with this argument is that in the same way that
disability cannot be understood simply by reading off
biological data, it is not simply a relfection of economic
developments either, What is acknowledged as “disability”
reflects a complex and historically-specific outcome of
cultural, political and ideological struggles. Disability
studies needs to emphasise indeterminacy, complexity,
agency, and the autonomy of political and cultural
developments.
Unfortunately, within the 'materialist theory of disability',
the influence of a crude form of Marxism is often evident.
This often has meant that poorly-theorised notions of class
have been utilised within disability studies. Unfortunately,
the failure of sociological thinkers to engage in any
meaningful way with the social model for many years has
meant that a rigorous debate on these issues never
really occurred.
A classic example of the poorly-theorised notions of class
within a great deal of disability studies was provided by Mike
Oliver in Critical Social Policy in 1984. In an article
entitled "The Politics of Disability", Oliver suggested that
"all social relations under capitalism are characterised by
oppression - one class oppresses another, and that disabled
people are therefore inevitably part of that oppressed class".
Although Oliver's later work was less economistic, I still
believe that there are remnants of this crude economism in
the materialist theoriy of disability which Oliver supports.
An alternative to economism is an emphasis on human agency. In
this regard, I have found a great deal of inspiration in the
work of E.P. Thompson. Thompson wrote on labour history, not
disability, but his seminal work "The Making of the English
Working Class" radically reshaped the thinking of many scholars
on class. For Thompson, the notion of class entailed a
relationship, enmeshed in real people and real contexts.
Rather than suggesting that social policies developed
according to 'the needs of capitalism', Thompson stressed
the need to study local social relations, institutions
and values. Thompson's emphasis on the cultural, experiential
and ideological elements of class resulted in increased
attention being placed on human agency. Thompson stressed the
need for studying local cultural, political and ideological
struggles.
In my own thinking on disability lately, I have been wondering
whether it would be possible to view disability as a
relationship also. So I am wondering whether there is any value
in focussing on this issue of disability as a relationship,
rather than a structure, or a barrier experienced by disabled
people. What I am suggesting is thatdisability is a
relationship which is fluent, changing, and culturally-specific.
Agency would obviously be fundamental to this relationship.
Disability could be considered a relationship both in the
macro sense (between disabled and non-disabled people in
society) and in a micro-sense (in individual relationships).
An essential element of this conceptualisation is that
disability is viewed as a relationship rather than a structure.
This theory is perfectly consistent with an argument that
people’s ability to struggle is determined by many social,
political and economic factors, but it focuses attention onto
the complex and contradictory processes which lead to the
development and maintainence of a disability identity.
Social relations, institutions, government policies and
broader cultural values play a particularly important role
in this process. The cultural, experiential and ideological
elements of disability (and conversely, ‘normality’) have
profound implications for the study of disability. This
means that increased emphasis must be placed on the
cultural and political activities undertaken by disabled
people and more attention paid to human agency.
It has recently been acknowledged within disability studies
that the language within which people understand disability
is an important factor in the development of shared experiences
and identities (Corker and French, 1999). So an emphasis on
the discourses used within disability may be warranted here.
Through language and discourse, people define and re-define
disability; they challenge certain labels, outline
opportunities for improvement, and indicate which obstacles
they perceive as significant. Language is not just a passive
medium for expressing interests, it actively constitutes
social identities.
So in my own work with brain injury survivors, we have applied these
concepts in the following ways:
* We discuss our history of individual and collective struggles
for a better life, as well as common physical and social
experiences. This is where agency is most apparent...
in everything from little things (like working hard for months
just to be able to feed yourself, just so you can have control
of that part of your life), to wider issues of becoming self
advocates and challenging professional dominance.
* We have discussed the ways in which our experiences of
disability are influenced by cultural concepts of normality,
and other cultural factors which devalue disabled people.
* We have looked at the local issues which have influenced our
agency (such as lack of funding, the historically low levels
of spending on social welfare issues in our state, etc)
* We have identified constraints on our agency (such as medical
dominance, lack of funding etc)
This is how I would suggest disability research which relies on an
emphasis on agency should be undertaken... collaboratively,
using an emancipatory disability approach, acknowledging
wider social factors, but looking at the attempts by
disabled people at a local level to create better lives for
themselves.
I would love to hear other people's opinions on seeing
disability as a relationship in this way.
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