By Jim Sandhu

A Brief History of Mainstreaming

The story sounds like something out of the theatre of the absurd. And even more implausible for a long term pan European worker in the field to believe. Little did one guess that beave-ring away in the dark corridors of the European Council of Ministers was a Joint Committee on the Rehabilitation and Resettlement of the Disabled. Hidden away from the gaze of public scrutiny and little known to so-called disability experts, it had been snoring away since April 1959.

After a dozen years of laid back deliberations, it impressed on the European Council of Ministers to pass Resolution A.P. (72) 5: "On the planning and equipment of buildings with a view to making them more acces-sible to the physically handicapped." Having completed this arduous task, the Committee appears to have fallen into a stupor and was not heard of again.

The Resolution had an Appendix, which fell into three sections regarding measures to be undertaken by the eight signatory member countries of the then European Union.

Section 1 was titled: Measures com-mon to all buildings and installations used by the public. This most detailed section covered accessibility antropo-metrics to lifts, doors, toilets, rooms, corridors, telephone kiosks, etc.

Section 2 was called: Specific mea-sures for certain buildings. This largely referred to public buildings such as post offices, theatres, banks, stations, schools, etc.

Section 3 was entirely focused on "Provisions for parking".

It must be said that not one single country took the slightest notice of this binding resolution – largely because no compliance measures were incorporated. Unlike the present day Ameri-can Disability Act, or the UK Disability Discrimination Act, or the Spanish Disabled Persons Act of 1982.

Rather strangely, long before these acts the UK, the most prolific legislator in the field since 1944 covering most topics affecting disabled people, had a half-hearted approach to prosecution and relied largely on voluntarism.

Once again, few authorities took much notice.

The great Civil Rights movement in the United States and its hard won civic rights for black people became a model for disabled people throughout Europe and the USA. This combined with increasing assertiveness born out of the Vietnam returnees who became the hub of the Veterans Administration set the ball rolling.

Since then, a sea changed in Europe – partly due to the non-legalistic practical implementation approach of the Nordic countries, even to the point of not having any definitions of "disability", and partly due to the burgeoning advent of telematics.

The latter has facilitated communication and exchange between disabled people and easy access to information. Access to information led to a form of collective empowerment which, directly or indirectly, led to the formation of the European Parliamentary Intergroup on Disability, the formation of the European Disability Forum, the Adaptation of the United Nations Standard Rules on the Equalization of Opportunity by the EU, and the introduction of Article 13 in the Amsterdam Treaty which focuses on equal opportunities.

On the periphery of these developments was the setting up of the Technology Initiative for Disabled and Elderly People (TIDE) by the European Commission. This, combined with the formation of European Cooperation in Science and Technology (COST 219), the establishment of the European Institute for Design and Disability (EIDD) and its national networks, helped to embed the concept of Design for All or Universal Design in most of the current policies of the EU.

Published in Crisp & Clear No. 2, July 2000