In search of European disability policy: Between national and global

This paper examines the development of disability policy at the European level, from the mid 1970s to the present day, based on documentary research. The development of European policy discourses in this period reflects dramatic changes of thinking about disability that are also evident in global policy debates driven by activism from the international disabled people's movement. Early policy, based on discourses care and rehabilitation, aimed to compensate for the presumed limitations of individual disabled people but policy today is more concerned with human rights, citizenship, full participation and the removal of structural barriers to inclusion. The analysis draws on theories of disability, Europeanization, policy transfer and globalisation to explain European Union (EU) policy development and its uneasy relationship with national and global policy regimes. This analysis suggests a characteristically “European” policy project, involving a socially-oriented but legalistic rights-based discourse. Europeanization is challenged on two fronts: by high levels of national subsidiarity in relevant policy domains and by the emergence of new global regimes of governance (including the United Nations Convention in 2007). The most significant policy catalysts are now at the global level while the most significant implementation constraints are at the national level. Yet, European actors remain important, providing strong support for implementation in member states and as policy entrepreneurs on the global stage.