Employment of Disabled Persons: Where Are We Going
![handle is hein.journals/intlr120 and id is 15 raw text is: International Labour Review, Vol. 120, No. 1, January-February 1981
Employment of disabled persons:
where are we going?
Norman ACTON*
Full participation and equality is the theme chosen by the United
Nations General Assembly for the International Year of Disabled Persons
in 1981. The objectives suggested by that theme are especially relevant
when we consider employment of people with disabilities. In most
situations the goals of full participation and equality cannot be achieved
unless satisfactory arrangements are made for productive and gainful
employment. The unfortunate reality, however, is that no country has
found the way to provide such employment or other appropriate
vocational outlets for all of its disabled inhabitants.
Failures in this important element in the rehabilitation process are
significant not only for their impact on the lives of the disabled individuals
involved, but also for the consequences they produce in the community
and the society. Ten per cent or more of the potential workforce may be
left idle, skills and talents are wasted, the time and resources of other
persons are deflected from productive activity to caring for and supporting
those who are disabled. These losses of productivity are accompanied by
economic drains on the nation, which must provide pensions and other
benefits for disabled people who are not gainfully occupied. We ... will
not avoid the costs merely by deciding to refrain from giving the occupa-
tionally handicapped work, the Director-General of the Swedish National
Labour Market Board has said. These costs will [have to be paid by]
society-and in greater amounts-under other headings.'
Hopefully, the International Year of Disabled Persons will stimulate
new and more effective efforts in all nations to enable their citizens who
are disabled to enjoy full participation and equality in their communities
and societies. Those efforts can succeed only when the nations have found
better solutions to the problems that limit the vocational opportunities of
disabled people. As in other aspects of the process of rehabilitation, the
vocational element is surrounded by misinformation, traditional stereo-
types and inaccurate suppositions. An analysis of the situation will benefit
from clarification of some of the relevant concepts.
* Secretary General, Rehabilitation International.
Copyright 0 International Labour Organisation 1981](ViewImageLocal?handle=hein.journals/intlr120&div=10&collection=&method=preview&ext=.png&size=3)
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Employment of Disabled Persons: Where Are We Going
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