Part I The concepts: The human rights framing of disability Chapter 2: Key elements of the human rights frame on disability KEY QUESTIONS • What are the key principles and concepts that encapsulate the human rights frame on disability? • How does the human rights frame help drive change? 2.1. THE OVERARCHING GOAL OF EQUALITY AND NON-DISCRIMINATION If we turn the traditional framing of disability away from the person and towards the problems facing that person, the next logical step is to tackle those problems. Persons with disabilities do not claim special rights or even ‘disability rights’. They claim the same human rights that are afforded equally to all. This is why it is said that the UN CRPD does not create any ‘new’ rights. Rather, it seeks practical ways to make existing rights real and meaningful in the lives of people with disabilities. As article 1 states, the Convention seeks the full and equal enjoyment of existing rights for and by persons with disabilities. An overarching commitment to equality therefore underpins the human rights frame on disability. Professor Oddny Arnardottir identifies three different generations of equality thinking in relation to disability: • Universal sameness (1950s – 1970s) • Specific difference (1970s – 1990s) • Multidimensional disadvantage (current trends).57 The first approach purports to treat people exactly the same, regardless of their differences. That approach, however, does nothing to advance the access rights of those in wheelchairs who, under this model, have an ‘equal’ right to climb stairs. The second approach takes a much more positive view of the difference of disability and seeks to accommodate them, which is reflected in the ‘reasonable accommodation’ obligation in anti-discrimination law. While it is an improvement, this approach does not tackle the cumulative effects of generations of exclusion. The third approach is much more attuned to accumulated disadvantages and multiple forms (and effects) of discrimination. It also seeks to reverse them. Arnardottir characterises the UN CRPD as belonging to the third approach and concludes that “the CRPD represents the more complex and layered human rights law appropriate to the challenges of the 21st century.”58 57 O. Arnardottir, ‘A Future of Multidimensional Disadvantage: Equality?’ in O. Arnardottir and G. Quinn (eds.), The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities: European and Scandinavian Perspectives, 2009, pp. 41-66. For a more general and classic statement on how to handle difference within the law, see M. Minow, Making all the Difference: Inclusion, Exclusion and American Law, 1991. 58 O. Arnardottir, ‘A Future of Multidimensional Disadvantage: Equality?’ in O. Arnardottir and G. Quinn (eds.), The UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities: European and Scandinavian Perspectives, 2009, p. 66. Chapter 2: Key elements of the human rights frame on disability | 21