Journal on Developmental Disabilities
Le journal sur les handicaps du développement

Abstract

Editor's note: The ideas presented in this paper primarily represent a useful, and user-friendly, summary of information contained in a report entitled "Enhancing the rights and personal freedoms of people with disabilities," published in 2000 by Accreditation Ontario and restated with permission.

In recent years, understanding disability as part of the range of human characteristics for which society has an obligation to respond positively is replacing models that focus on individual deficits. Positive social response includes protection of human rights for people with disabilities. Yet, the history of services for people with developmental disabilities in Canada is fraught with human rights violations, and many continue in a variety of forms today. This paper summarizes basic rights protection for people with developmental disabilities in Canada, and points out numerous examples, both past and present, of how easy it is to violate those rights.

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