The social model of disability at the university level: assumptions, implications, progress and challenges

Abstract

Over the last decades, the Social Model of Disability gained relevance in the orientation of educational inclusion policies at the university level in Argentina. Under the assumption that the causes of disability are fundamentally social, it focuses on the actions necessary to overcome the barriers that undermine disabled people’s right to education “on equal terms” as their peers. But the significance of this proclamation, whose concretion is far from being achieved, requires a careful analysis of its assumptions and implications from a philosophical-political perspective. Understanding that disability constitutes a “bivalent community” (Fraser, 2000), in the present work we will argue that only insofar as it is translated into policies that are jointly supported by redistribution and recognition, does the Social Model present a fertile orientation for educational justice. For this, the nature of the historically inherited exclusion factors and of some policies implemented in response at the institutional level will be examined, considering three categories of analysis: "formal accessibility", "academic accessibility" and "psycho-socio-cultural accessibility". We conclude by pointing out some pending challenges and possible implications of articles like this one.