Independent Living Institute

Dear Friends: We write to you because we believe certain persons and organizations who claim to speak for persons with disabilities may have seriously misrepresented the views of many of us.

Public attention in recent years has focused on issues surrounding end-of-life care. We believe this is all to the good. Death, like birth, is part of the life process, neither to be feared nor denied. In truth, the end of life can be a time of expressing and sharing love, forgiveness and thankfulness. We believe end-of-life choices are a private matter. Interest groups, legislators, judges, and publicity-seekers have no business interfering with the decision-making autonomy of the dying patient.

In English

Andrew Batavia är Associate Professor vid School of Policy and Management, College of Urban and Public Affairs, Florida International University, North Miami, Florida.

Artikeln, Prospects for a National Personal Assistance Services Program: Enhancing Choice for People with Disabilities, är tidigare publicerad i American Rehabilitation Volym 24, nummer 4 Vintern 1998 Personal Assistance Services del 2 av 2. American Rehabilitation är Rehabilitation Services Adminsitrations (RSA) officiella organ. Adress: 330 C Street S.W Washington D.C. 20202-2531

På svenska

Mr. Batavia is Associate Professor, School of Policy and Management, College of Urban and Public Affairs, Florida International University, North Miami, Florida.

von Elke Bartz, Vorsitzende
Forum Selbstbestimmter Assistenz Behinderter Menschen e.V.

Zunächst möchte ich mich recht herzlich für die Einladung zu diesem Workshop bedanken und kurz vorstellen. Mein Name ist Elke Bartz. Ich wohne mit meinem Mann Gerhard in Hollen- bach, einem kleinen Dorf in Deutschland, genau gesagt in Baden Württemberg. Seit einem Autounfall vor 21 Jahren bin ich ab dem 6. und 7. Halswirbel querschnittgelähmt. Daher benötige ich rund um die Uhr Assistenz. Ich engagiere mich seit mehreren Jahren intensiv in der Arbeit für Menschen mit Be- hinderungen.

by Suresh C. Ahuja
Executive Director National Association of the Blind, India
Chairman World Blind Union Committee on Social Development

Report of the CIB Expert Seminar on Building Non-Handicapping Environments, Harare 1992

Accessible, adaptable low-cost housing in Egypt

Dr. Safaa M. Issa Abdou, Development & Popular Housing Co., Cairo, Egypt

Contents

Introduction

Architecture is a measure of society's advancement or retardation and a record of nations' civilization. Man is civilization's creator and its primary architect who set its foundations and raised its magnificent, tall edifices. And for Man there has always been the pursuit of civilization, freedom and equality.

Colin Barnes, Disability Research Unit, Leeds

I’d like to thank Adolf and the Institute for Independent Living for inviting me here.

Prof. Colin Barnes, Disability Research Unit, Leeds, UK

In England we have a strong and vibrant disability people’s movement which in many ways preceded the development of Disabled People’s International (DPI). The British Council of Organisations of Disabled People (BCODP) was actually formed so that it could be represented at and participate in the first DPI conference in 1981. The driving force behind much of the work initiated within the British movement was done by a disabled South African man, Vic Finkelstein.

Geneva, Switzerland, August 1988

This text is courtesy the

(BIC Document #88-0806 )

Until recently, the disabled have constituted a minority in obscurity. Unlike certain other groups that fall victim to discrimination, the disabled do not comprise a self-contained, close-knit social community. Instead, they populate every social sector, every class, every age group, every ethnic and religious community. And at every level, society has tended to ignore them, believing them incapable of participating in the community, or avoiding them as unpleasant reminders of the fragility of our existence.