In June 2005, Dr Maria Kett, Sue Stubbs, Rebecca Yeo, Shivaram Deshpande and Victor Cordeiro (as members of the International Disability and Development Consortium), carried out some DFID-funded research in tsunami affected areas.
The aim of the research was to promote the inclusion of disability in emergency, conflict and refugee programmes. The main objectives were to assess:
- the extent of inclusion
- the impact of networking
- the role of resources in post-tsunami contexts
In their research (which focused on the post-emergency phase), the team found that inclusion happened to an extent, but not normally at the higher levels of decision-making. Also, although the language of inclusion and the social model of disability were widespread, people did not tend to understand what this meant in practice.
Some of the key findings were:
- The large amounts of funding available created some problems because the money did not seem to be reaching poor DPOs or the grass roots level, and there was a pressure to spend quickly which sometimes resulted in rash decisions.
- The disability sector seemed to isolate itself and didn’t really engage with mainstream development issues. DPOs often had little contact with most poor disabled people.
- Statistics on disability were problematic, and there was a tendancy to refer to the disabled community as a homogenous group.
Some of the recommendations made by the researchers were:
- Research, guidelines and training are needed for field staff on the social model of disability and inclusion, and what they mean in practice.
- There needs to be more association between the disability and development communities.
- The disability sector should consider grouping together with other marginalised groups.
- More research is required on how local DPOs and other local organisations can could be strengthened quickly to respond in emergency situations.
- Efforts need to be made by donors to find out how much of the tsunami funding has actually been received by DPOs and local organisations.
- Grass-roots networking and alliances should be promoted.
Click here to link to a full report of the research on the website
