Disability Justice: Teachings in Resistance and Liberation

July was Disability Justice month. This article reflects what I have been reading and thinking about in the past month. 

When most people hear “disability rights,” they picture ramps, accessible bathrooms, or sign language interpreters at public events. These are important for creating equitable access, but that is only one piece of an intricate patchwork quilt we call humanity. 

Disability Justice is a broader, deeper framework that goes beyond the rights framework. It doesn’t just ask how to increase accessibility in existing systems, it asks how to transform ableist systems so that all types of disabled people can thrive as well. 

A Brief History: From Rights to Justice

The disability rights movement in the U.S. gained momentum in the 1960s-1990s, pushing for legal protections like independent living (including deinstitutionalization) and the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA, 1990). 

In 1977, a historic sit-in at offices of the Department of Health Education and Welfare across the United States led to the addition of Section 504 to the Rehabilitation Act, extending civil rights to people with disabilities.

Also in 1977, the Canadian government passed the Human Rights Act. The act now prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex, gender identity and expression, sexual orientation, race, national and ethnic origin, religion, marital status, family, disability, or pardoned offence. Disability is defined as “any previous or existing mental or physical disability and includes disfigurement and previous or existing dependence on alcohol or a drug.”

The foundational work in disability rights was and is essential. But as activists pointed out, those wins often centred the needs of white, cisgender, heterosexual, and physically disabled people. It also created a complaints-based system that required a lot of work on the part of disabled people to fight for access to spaces and choices. 

In 2005, Sins Invalid, a collective of disabled queer women of color, including Patty Berne, Mia Mingus, and Stacey Milbern, coined the term “Disability Justice.” They described the need for a shift this way: 

“While a concrete and radical move forward toward justice, the disability rights movement simultaneously invisibilized the lives of peoples who lived at intersecting junctures of oppression – disabled people of color, immigrants with disabilities, queers with disabilities, trans and gender non-conforming people with disabilities, people with disabilities who are houseless, people with disabilities who are incarcerated, people with disabilities who have had their ancestral lands stolen, amongst others.

And, like many movements, it is contextualized within its era of emergence and left us with “cliff-hangers”: it is single issue identity based; its leadership has historically centered white experiences; its framework leaves out other forms of oppression and the ways in which privilege is leveraged at differing times and for various purposes; it centers people with mobility impairments, marginalizing other forms of impairment; and centers people who can achieve rights and access through a legal or rights-based framework. The political strategy of the disability rights movement relied on litigation and the establishment of a disability bureaucratic sector at the expense of developing a broad-based popular movement.”

Scholars like Robert McRuer advanced crip theory, bringing insights into queer disability culture and reclaiming disability as resistance. Liat Ben-Moshe has brought critical disability studies into abolitionist discourses, demonstrating how the prison system and ableism intersect in systems of oppression.

Departing from the rights-based model, the Disability Justice framework is an intersectional approach that recognizes how ableism overlaps with racism, sexism, transphobia, homophobia, colonialism, and capitalism. Disability Justice looks at all of these issues, recognizing how diverse systems of oppression interact and reinforce each other, and seeks to resist and offer another way.

Because of this broader focus, the Disability Justice movement is the most comprehensive way to create lasting change for people with disabilities and who are multiply marginalized. To me, it represents an inclusive kinship model to inform our relationships, advocacy, and navigation through the world. 

The Disability Justice Community Today

Disability Justice is a dynamic global movement. Leaders like Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha (Care Work) and Alice Wong (Year of the Tiger, Disability Visibility) amplify disabled and racialized voices in literature, art, and politics. Community organizations advocate daily for systemic change. Individual influencers and writers get thousands of views on videos and articles advancing just treatment. 

The community today is diverse and constantly adapting. We have activists and artists pushing for ethical and cultural change. We have grassroots mutual aid networks that support each other (particularly where government-based social systems have failed) to access food, medical supplies, housing, and care. We have educators and scholars expanding our understandings of ableism and what liberation actually means. 

Governments in Canada are implementing accessibility standards in key areas. The Government of Saskatchewan has passed The Accessible Saskatchewan Act, and is working on implementation of accessibility standards across the province. I moderated a panel of lawyers and former lawyers that explored questions on this process, which you can see here. I can also be hired, along with my team of subcontractors to do accessibility assessments and planning.

Wait, I thought you support people recovering from chronic illness? 

I do. Many people with short and long term chronic illness (like Long COVID, ME/CFS, fibromyalgia) can recover and heal from them, and helping them find appropriate resources is an honour. 

However, some people will never be able to recover fully because of complex factors like lack of access to care, low finances, complicated caregiver responsibilities, co-occuring conditions, genetics, or mindset. And, many chronic illnesses, diseases, or disabilities are permanent. 

Also, many of us who start healing journeys uncover disabilities that have been there the whole time, like ADHD, Autism, OCD, and PTSD, etc. We learn we belong to the neurodivergent community, who are often leaders in the Disability Justice community as well.

Why It Matters to Everyone

The latest legal definition adopted by the province of Saskatchewan says disability is:

Any impairment that, in interaction with a barrier, hinders an individual’s full and equal participation in society, and includes:

(a) a physical, mental, intellectual, cognitive, learning, communication or sensory impairment; and

(b) a functional limitation;

whether permanent, temporary or episodic in nature, or evident or not.

(The Accessible Saskatchewan Act)

This definition, similar to the one in The Saskatchewan Human Rights Code, is broad and inclusive, meaning it includes temporary, episodic, and permanent disabilities of many kinds. 

If you’re lucky to live long enough, you’ll experience disability in some form, through illness, injury, aging, or mental health. That means disability justice isn’t a niche issue; it’s a vision for a world we all benefit from.

When we build systems that truly value interdependence, community care, access and liberation, we’re creating environments where:

• Workers can take sick leave and medical leave without risking their jobs.

• Public spaces welcome people of all body types, mobility levels, energy levels, and sensory needs.

• Technology is designed with flexibility from the start.

As Mia Mingus writes, “Access is not the same as justice.” Access is great, but how about a just community? Justice asks us to change the conditions so access isn’t an afterthought, it’s woven into the patchwork of our communities.

In a time when there is a rise of populism and fascism globally, disability justice is especially important. Under fascist governments, anyone can be labelled as disabled or impaired if it is convenient for a certain agenda, often also tied with policies. Our racialized, trans and or gay community members (with or without mental illness) are often the first targets for such attacks. Think of forced sterilization, institutionalization, imprisonment. In the past, fascist governments have use scapegoating to blame disabled people for "burdening" the government with costs. Moving beyond a disability rights framework to disability justice is essential to our communities. 

Where to Start

If you want to learn more, explore:

• Sins Invalid – Skin, Tooth, and Bone

• Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha – Care Work: Dreaming Disability Justice

• Alice Wong – Disability Visibility and Year of the Tiger

• Mia Mingus – writings at Leaving Evidence

• You can access much of this in this training hub: https://projectlets.org/disability-justice 

You can contact your local representatives and inquire if they are prioritizing the disabled community in their policy decisions. Ask if they are hiring disabled people as consultants, not just asking them to fill out countless “community surveys”, aka free labour. 

Disability justice is an invitation—not just to imagine a better world, but to help build it.

 

Sources:

World Institute on Disability
Disability Justice Network of Ontario