{"id":1867,"date":"2025-12-18T17:48:52","date_gmt":"2025-12-18T22:48:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/accessiblehealthcare\/?post_type=chapter&p=1867"},"modified":"2026-02-02T11:26:19","modified_gmt":"2026-02-02T16:26:19","slug":"the-social-model","status":"publish","type":"chapter","link":"https:\/\/pressbooks.library.torontomu.ca\/accessiblehealthcare\/chapter\/the-social-model\/","title":{"raw":"The Social Model","rendered":"The Social Model"},"content":{"raw":"

From Individual Bodies to Disabling Environments<\/span><\/h2>\r\nThe social model framework arose from the experience and analysis of disabled people. An analysis that \u201crelocated\u201d the problem of disability from bodies and minds to the social, political, cultural, and physical contexts or environments in which people lived was articulated first by the [pb_glossary id=\"822\"]Union of the Physically Impaired Against Segregation[\/pb_glossary] (UPIAS) in 1972. Growing awareness of the poor social conditions of disabled people, coupled with inspiration from the international civil rights and protest movements of the 1960s and 70s, the social model provided a powerful articulation of everyday and structural disabling conditions. Like other civil rights movements, expertise was not only held by professionals but with people who had lived experiences of both their bodies and their social, economic, and political conditions.\r\n
\r\n\r\n\"Video\r\n

Media Moment<\/h3>\r\nTime: 1 minute, 29 seconds<\/strong>\r\n\r\nThis YouTube video from the UK-based organization Whizz Kidz speaks to the impact of the social model.\r\n\r\nWatch the following video here, access it at the link below, or the transcript.\r\n\r\n[embed]https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=z-rEnKcZ5w0[\/embed]\r\n\r\nThe Social Model of Disability<\/a>\r\n\r\n[h5p id=\"39\"]<\/span>\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n

Impairment, Disability, and Barriers<\/span><\/h2>\r\nA key tenet of the social model is the distinction it draws between impairment and disability. Impairment refers to functional differences (seeing differently, moving differently, etc.). Disability refers to processes of disablement \u2013 literal or figurative barriers in the world that prevent people living with impairments from enacting their desires, participating fully in and taking ownership of their lives. Advocacy, activism, service and policy were reoriented to focus on removing and dismantling disabling barriers, rather than fixing people. In the hopes of early disability activists, disability oppression would be mitigated.\r\n\r\n\r\nLocating the problems faced by disabled people in disabling contextual conditions rather than medical conditions was a necessary shift of worldview. The social model\u2019s simplicity and remarkable effectiveness upon implementation led to its widespread adoption. Since its inception, we have seen its broad application in fields such as architecture, employment legislation, cultural production, classrooms, healthcare, and in the [pb_glossary id=\"775\"]World Health Organization[\/pb_glossary] definitions of disability (2011).\r\n\r\nFor more, read the World Health Organization\u2019s World Report on Disability<\/a> to learn about how different frameworks of disability come together.\r\n\r\n\r\n
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\u201cThe emergence of the social model in critical disability theory represented the idea that disability is not an impairment in need of repair, but rather is the byproduct of a collection of disadvantages manufactured by social norms and regulations, policies and practices, and economic and political actors. Essential to the social model is the duty to accommodate disability by removing societal barriers that impede access and propagate prejudice.\u201d<\/p>\r\n

\u2014 Chadha & Rogers, 2023, p. 237<\/p>\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\n

\r\n\r\n\"Community\r\n

<\/a>From the Community<\/h3>\r\nAs you engage with Kayleigh\u2019s clip below, consider how disability is produced through assumptions embedded in healthcare systems rather than through individual impairment.\r\n\r\n[embed]https:\/\/youtu.be\/3OJSrM77APU[\/embed]\r\n\r\n[h5p id=\"59\"]<\/span>\r\n\r\n<\/div>\r\nThe [pb_glossary id=\"659\"]social model[\/pb_glossary] paved the way for foundational concepts like accessibility and accommodation, independent living, barrier removal, and disability rights legislation. No model can adequately address the complexity of disabled people\u2019s lives; through critical engagement with its limitations, the social model has supported expanded understandings of disability, particularly those that hold space for chronic pain, chronic and episodic illness, and neurodiversity.","rendered":"

From Individual Bodies to Disabling Environments<\/span><\/h2>\n

The social model framework arose from the experience and analysis of disabled people. An analysis that \u201crelocated\u201d the problem of disability from bodies and minds to the social, political, cultural, and physical contexts or environments in which people lived was articulated first by the