'From a source of shame to the pride of the Island:' Disability, Advocacy & the Media in Ireland, 1959-2003. (360G-Wellcome-108597_Z_15_Z)

This project will examine the treatment and perception of the disabled community in Ireland during the period 1959-2003. Its objectives are fourfold. First, to provide the first detailed history of disability/disability provision in Ireland in this period. Second, to examine how the perception of the disabled changed, from viewing disability as indicative of divine will (necessitating seclusion from broader society), to the view that state policy must show an awareness of the need for self-regul ation and autonomy for members of the Disabled Community. Third, to unravel the impact of those changes in the development of the Irish state's system of disability provision, as the duty of care increasingly shifted towards state mechanisms of support and care. This led to the introduction of new systems of care, provided by the state, including disability benefit and the carer's allowance, fundamentally changing the level of state intervention in their lives. Finally, to provide an insight int o how community integration became the standard mode of disability care and how the current system of state provision for the disabled came into being. Thus, the central research questions will be around what shaped and catalysed change to the care systems for the disabled in Ireland?