Lisa Vanhala Disability Rights Summary

Lisa Vanhala’s paper, “Disability Rights Activists in the Supreme Court of Canada: Legal Mobilization Theory and Accommodating Social Movements” follows the shift in ideology and emergence of disability rights within the Canadian framework. Vanhala’s research analyzes the evolution of disability rights through their use of strategic litigation (Vanhala, 2009). Vanhala first examines the shift of the medical model of disability to the social model of disability. The medical model of disability convinces the public that disabilities are a form of medical illness. Therefore, the medical model suggests that disabilities, with the intervention of medical science will find a cure or a method to correct it. However, the second model, the social model of disabilities,

The paternalistic view of disability as a medical defect or pathological limitations that viewed disabilities through medicalization which suggests that there is something that needs to be fixed or corrected with these individuals (Vanhala, 2009). Soon, the medical model was overthrown by the social model of disability which suggested the adjustment of norms and to provide better accessibility to persons with disabilities. This new ideology influenced the change of narrative of people with disabilities (Vanhala, 2009). Grassroot organizations for disabilities relied on the paternalistic view, their attempt was to raise money as charitable contributions by demonstrating pity and sickness (Vanhala, 2009). The introduction of the social model led the organizations to adopt another stance which moved away from presenting disabilities as a sickness or incapability; rather they sought to governments to fund their organizations just as government actively fund many other human rights organizations. This marked a change from viewing organizations for disabilities as a charitable organization to a self-deterministic organization (Vanhala,