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Deploying Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) to Enhance Participation in Local Governance for Citizens with Disabilities
Abstract
Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) offer a promising technology for citizens with disabilities to participate in local e-governance planning and implementation, provided that underlying issues of social exclusion and technology accessibility are properly addressed. Existing research suggests that for citizens with disabilities gateway issues such as technology access, usability, community- and government-receptivity are barriers to participation in local e-governance. Results from a pilot study indicate that the e-governance landscape for people with disabilities is heterogeneous; likely reflecting both differences within the disability community, as well as among the online governance entities. Systematic changes to the development, implementation, and evaluation of local e-governance for people with disabilities are recommended, informed by an analytical model suitable for empirical testing.
... 2007; Phang, Sutanto, Kankanhalli, Li, Tan, & Teo (2006). Questions arise about the level of accessibility and usability of new media and technologies: in particular, whether new technologies are serving as facilitators or barriers to community participation, and what policies and practices can be developed to address this gap (Kaplan, et al., 2006; Bricout, et al., 2010). If these barriers can be mitigated, aging members of society may be able to harness the potential of these technologies and social media platforms to increase social and work participation. ...
... While studies are beginning to appear on the use of the Internet and Internet related information technologies (e.g., Bradley and Poppen 2003; Finn 1999; Grimaldi and Goette1999; Guo, Bricout and Huang 2005; Seymour and Lupton 2004), the landscape of the disability divide is just coning clear (Dobransky and Hargittai, 2006, Jaeger and Xie, 2009). Barriers such as cost, accessibility, awareness, and basic interest, have replaced earlier divide issues related to basic access (Baker and Moon 2008, Bricout and Baker, 2010). ...
... Telework, defined as paid work using ICT at least one day a week from a non proximate (out of office) site increases employment opportunities for individuals who are not able to travel to a central location, due to mobility or transportation issues, as well as for those who must alter their schedule due to fatigue or care needs (Baker, Moon, & Ward, 2006; Bricout, et al., 2010). Given the central role of employment and work in social participation, these features make telework a key tool in remaining engaged in society, and an appealing work arrangement, especially those who have appropriate independent work habits and would benefit from a flexible schedule with performance-based evaluations. ...
Communication-oriented Internet technologies and activities such as social media sites and blogs, have become an important component of community and employment participation, not just in the specific function of activities, but as a link to larger communities of practice and professional connections. The occurrence of these activities, evident in their presence on Facebook, LinkedIn and other online communities, represents an important opportunity to reframe and re-conceptualize manifestation of communities especially those in which distributed networks and communities substitute for geographic proximity, offering new opportunities for engagement, especially those who might be functionally limited in terms of mobility. For people with disabilities, as well as the aging, increasingly interacting online, the readiness of social networking sites to accommodate their desire to participate, in conjunction with their readiness as users to maximize the potential of platform interfaces and architecture, are critical to achieving the medium’s potential for enhancing community and employment benefits. This paper explores representation/presence of disability and aging using as frames, Facebook and LinkedIn groups. Target identity/member groups on Facebook and LinkedIn were catalogued to explore the presence and representation of disability and aging identities in a socially networked setting. The groups for this study were identified using the search feature designed into the platform architecture, which allow a user to search on specifically designated entities or keywords. Findings suggest that from a policy perspective, institutions need to be cognizant of population characteristics as well as platform opportunities implementing advocacy and relevant support services for people with disabilities and older adults to full ensure engagement and participation.
... The fact that local governments are embedded within local communities means that they have a deeper understanding and knowledge of the unique communities they govern and are well placed to lead the public policy drive toward social inclusion [1]. Researchers have investigated the role of local governments as the drivers of more diverse and inclusive communities across the globe and across a range of policy areas and population groups, including refugee migrants [2], sexuality and intersectionality [3], older people [4], workforce inclusion [5] and people with a disability [6,7]. This research paper focuses on local governments with respect to disability inclusion, specifically the inclusion of people with an intellectual disability. ...
Despite many initiatives to reframe and support inclusion for people with disabilities, people with intellectual disabilities continue to experience social exclusion in their local communities. This study shares the perspectives of people with an intellectual disability on what matters to them in their local communities. This study aims to inform local governments of the value of engaging with and listening to local people with intellectual disabilities and is an important exploration of how the social sustainability of cities is framed and valued by people who have historically been socially and geographically excluded. Focus groups and interviews were conducted in six local government areas, with a mix of metropolitan and regional areas, in two states of Australia—NSW and Victoria. The study analysed how 45 Australian adults with intellectual disabilities described their local communities and conceptualised better inclusion. The results were collated and organised by applying an adapted framework of inclusive cities. The participants expressed the need for safe, accessible and clean public amenities; accessible information; appropriate communication; and for people to be more respectful, friendly and understanding of the needs of people with intellectual disabilities. This study suggests that local governments can take action in order to improve social sustainability by engaging with local people with intellectual disabilities as citizens, advisors and employees, and by educating the wider community about respect and social inclusion for all.
... People with disabilities report feelings of unequal power relations, negative perceptions of ability, lack of knowledge and inadequate consultation related to eGovernment services (John and Paul, 2012). While web accessibility and usability have been on the agenda for some time (Jaeger, 2006, Huang, 2003, there has been little research outside of the health realm aimed at creating services that could improve quality of life for people with disabilities. ...
The Electronic Journal of e-Government 16/2:
Information and communication technologies (ICT) are important for people with disability in their day‑to‑day life, as they offer possibilities and opportunities for these people to enjoy a range of new social interactions. In this article we examine the affordances of different types of social media and discuss the dichotomy between simplicity of use and social presence. Further, we discuss the implications of these affordances for development of public e‑services aimed at improving the social life of people with disabilities. Our findings show that virtual worlds are the most engaging medium. However, other social media can to some extent offer the same affordances for people with disability. We suggest that future research should empirically investigate the affordances offered by social media to people with disability and find ways of combining the affordance perspective with usability studies to fill the void in the category high social presence/low complexity of use. Finally, we present suggestions for development of an e‑service that can fill this gap and create a viable social medium for people with disability.
... Earlier studies show that social networks decrease the barriers of interpersonal discourse and communication and are highly functional for people who for various reasons struggle to maintain strong social networks (Ellison et al., 2007). However, scholars do not share a one-sided perspective on the utility of the internet and OSN for people with disabilities Some scholars points to the positive changes that internet communications bring to people with disabilities, (Grimaldi & Goette, 1999;Richard et al., 2008;Jaeger & Xie, 2009;Bricout & Baker, 2010;Forman et al., 2011;Gage, 2013), while other scholars offer more pessimistic findings on the exaggerated usefulness of ITC and point to the unresolved issue of the digital divide that is not solved by access to internet alone (Roulstone, 1998;Oliver, Barnes, Tomas, 2001;Goggin & Newell, 2003;Harris, 2010). ...
People with disabilities are one of the targeted groups that have social participation restrictions due to the disabling barriers that exist in real world physical and social environments. Growing evidence from analyses of online social network site usage suggests that these sites could complement to and enhance people's networks of relationships present in the offline world by providing a platform for active communication between friends, acquaintances and other people in a network. However, it is important to know how people with disabilities self-assess online social networking as a means to overcome restrictions for social participation. The research objectives focused on the relationship between online social networking and offline social participation among people with motor, visual and hearing disabilities. The study aims to investigate the evaluation of the usefulness of social activity in OSN, types, frequency and motives of online social networks activity among people with disabilities and how it is related to their disability forms and the level of offline social participation restriction. For the purposes of the study a national representative survey of people with disabilities (18 years and older) who use social network sites, was conducted by Baltic Surveys Ltd, in June-July, 2014. Results of the statistical analysis showed that that evaluation of OSN as a facilitator of social involvement is quite high, but is only weakly positively correlated to offline participation. There are positive correlation between offline participation restrictions and motives to expand one‘s social network and to seek out people with similar disabilities. However, in Lithuania people with disabilities have a relatively not very high use of OSN as facilitated opportunities to compensate their offline participation restriction and to enhance their social capital.
Drawing on nationally representative survey 2014 data, this article examines the implications of social networking sites (SNS) use and the relationship with perceived online social capital among Lithuanian adults with and without disabilities. By contributing to the wide academic discussion on the value of online and social networks for people with disabilities, this research shows that intensive participation on SNS (as Facebook) presupposes stronger affective and evaluative dimensions of social capital. This relatively strong affective and evaluative social capital perception is more characteristic of the persons with disabilities (both with physical and sensory disabilities) than the persons without disabilities. The research data also shows that adults with physical disabilities mainly benefit from SNS as a bridging capital resource thanks to its various practical benefits, established connections and contacts, and participation according to one's interests by bypassing the limitations posed by the physical environment. These results add to the positive, optimistic information technology and disability studies discourse which argues that the use of social networking sites is of higher value to the persons with disabilities than the persons without disabilities.
Background
Good governance may result in strengthened performance of a health system. Coherent policies are essential for good health system governance. The overall aim of this research is to provide the best available scientific evidence on principles of good policy related leadership and governance of health related rehabilitation services in less resourced settings. This research was also conducted to support development of the World Health Organization’s (WHO) Guidelines on health related rehabilitation. Methods
An innovative study design was used, comprising two methods: a systematic search and realist synthesis of literature, and a Delphi survey of expert stakeholders to refine and triangulate findings from the realist synthesis. In accordance with Pawson and Tilley’s approach to realist synthesis, we identified context mechanism outcome pattern configurations (CMOCs) from the literature. Subsequently, these CMOCs were developed into statements for the Delphi survey, whereby 18 expert stakeholders refined these statements to achieve consensus on recommendations for policy related governance of health related rehabilitation. ResultsSeveral broad principles emerged throughout formulation of recommendations: participation of persons with disabilities in policy processes to improve programme responsiveness, efficiency, effectiveness, and sustainability, and to strengthen service-user self-determination and satisfaction; collection of disaggregated disability statistics to support political momentum, decision-making of policymakers, evaluation, accountability, and equitable allocation of resources; explicit promotion in policies of access to services for all subgroups of persons with disabilities and service-users to support equitable and accessible services; robust inter-sectoral coordination to cultivate coherent mandates across governmental departments regarding service provision; and ‘institutionalizing’ programmes by aligning them with preexisting Ministerial models of healthcare to support programme sustainability. Conclusions
Alongside national policymakers, our policy recommendations are relevant for several stakeholders, including service providers and service-users. This research aims to provide broad policy recommendations, rather than a strict formula, in acknowledgement of contextual diversity and complexity. Accordingly, our study proposes general principles regarding optimal policy related governance of health related rehabilitation in less resourced settings, which may be valuable across diverse health systems and contexts.
The chapter provides an overview of online research methods for urban and planning research. In examining different digital technologies and Web-based research methods, applied in different stages of the research process, in particular during data acquisition and data analysis, the chapter discusses critical differences and similarities between conventional paper-and-pencil research settings and online research environments. In this outline, the chapter addresses methodological procedures and ethical concerns in research conducted online with respondents or human participants, and ends looking to future directions for online research methods in the field of urban and planning studies.
Communication-oriented Internet technologies and activities such as social media sites and blogs, have become an important component of community and employment participation, not just in the specific function of activities, but as a link to larger communities of practice and professional connections. The occurrence of these activities, evident in their presence on Facebook, LinkedIn and other online communities, represents an important opportunity to reframe and re-conceptualize manifestation of communities especially those in which distributed networks and communities substitute for geographic proximity, offering new opportunities for engagement, especially those who might be functionally limited in terms of mobility.
For people with disabilities, as well as the aging, increasingly interacting online, the readiness of social networking sites to accommodate their desire to participate in conjunction with their readiness as users to maximize the potential of platform interfaces and architecture, are critical to achieving the medium’s potential for enhancing community and employment benefits. This essay explores representation/presence of disability and aging using as frames, Facebook and LinkedIn groups. Target identity/member groups on Facebook and LinkedIn were cataloged to explore the presence and representation of disability and aging identities in a socially networked setting.
The groups for this study were identified using the search feature designed into the platform architecture, which allow a user to search on specifically designated entities or keywords. Findings suggest that from a policy perspective, institutions need to be cognizant of population characteristics as well as platform opportunities implementing advocacy and relevant support services for people with disabilities and older adults to full ensure engagement and participation.
This article investigates how differences in social ties lead to differences in the social use of information and communication technology (ICT) and vice versa. The article draws on a qualitative study in the field of disability studies. Through this study of a marginalized subgroup of youth, the article advances insight into the permeability of the real and the virtual and extends the notion of established concepts of social ties and digital differentiation. The youth in the current study are 23 disabled Norwegians aged 15—20 years. The analysis is based on the principles of grounded theory and is characterized by a constant content comparative process. The outcome of this analysis shows how social ties of a marginalized subgroup of young people hold different characteristics than established notions anticipate, how these characteristics are vital in youths' interaction in offline and online life and how this interaction implies a mixed reality.
In a representational democracy, the process of selecting people to represent the electorate is critical. To accomplish this goal, it is crucial that elections be fair and accurate reflections of the decisions of the voters. However, a significant and relatively unacknowledged constituency, people with disabilities, faces a variety of barriers to full participation in the U.S. electoral democracy. Recent research has provided evidence that how people with disabilities vote is just as important as the physical barriers they face when casting their votes. This article presents an overview of the literature addressing issues that affect how people with disabilities vote, with an especial focus on the role of election officials as both facilitators and inhibitors of voting by people with disabilities.
This essay examines the relevance of socio-material space to the social model. The social model has been criticised as being disembodied. While there is some basis for this critique, the social model, in fact, has 'bodies in space' as a central concern. A distinction is made between disability as a sociocultural and biomedical category, and as a state of 'not being able to'. The latter usage is not just relevant to people with disabilities. In order to illustrate the strength of the social model, disabling social organisations of space-time practises are examined with a special emphasis on transport-public space. It is concluded that the social model offers insights into relationships between bodies, embodied agency and the social organisation of space-time.
The European Union Sustainable Development Strategy stated that sustainable development was a long‐term European Union's strategy safeguarding clean and healthy environment and better quality of life for the present and future generations. People with disabilities are perhaps the single segment of society with the most to gain from the new technologies of the electronic age. Yet they are among the lowest rates of use of these technologies. As a result, the potential benefits of computers and the Internet to the disability community are a long way from being realized. Computer technology and the Internet have a tremendous potential to broaden the lives and increase the independence of people with disabilities. Those who have difficulty leaving their homes can now log in and order groceries, shop for appliances, research health questions, participate in online discussions, catch up with friends, or make new ones. Development of information society is one of main three Lithuanian state priorities stated in State long‐term strategy. It fits aims of the European Union. Lithuanian information society development's aims are coordinated with norms of Lisbon strategy and initiative “e‐Europe – information society for all”. It is quite important that disabled persons could use IT opportunities. Research presents analysis of the main state Internet sites with purpose to establish how these sites are fitted to demands of disabled persons.
This article relates the participative model to the consecration of a citizen-centred individualism based upon an experiential conception of citizenship. Inspired by theories of recognition, it examines the affiliation effect of the components of social participation. It looks at the identity-based impact of involvement in social processes, of the links created with family and friends. Above and beyond the possibilities of participation, it thus links citizenship with the possibilities of participating on an equal basis, i.e. the possibility of interacting with others as an equal. In this way it offers an identity-based approach to disability which takes into consideration the relationships of inter-dependency that unite disabled persons with able-bodied persons, and relates the understanding of the phenomenon of disability to the forms of invisibilization which erode one's positive relationship with oneself and which distance people from the demands of participation.
Some of the earliest and best-known theoretical work on the social implications of the Internet focus on interpersonal interactions with other users met online. However, in part because of the difficulty of measuring the level of interactions with others met online, generalizable empirical research on this topic remains limited. In this study, the authors develop a new approach to measuring the degree of online interactions with those not known offline. Next, they test the relationship between these online social interactions and social capital using a probability sample survey of U.S. residents. Contrary to previous empirical investigations, they find that the level of online interaction with people met on the Internet positively relates to common indicators of social capital, such as generalized trust. Finally, they discuss the implications of these results.
The physical environment is the space in which people with a disability participate in the public sphere. The community provides a suitable unit of analysis for investigating the interaction between the physical environment and persons with a disability because it is the common space in which public participation is played out. The places, physical features, structures and objects that constitute the physical environment bear the inscription of the social, political and economic environments. The physical environment reciprocally influences the social, political and economic environments, as well as the perceptions of participants in the public sphere. Community receptivity is a concept that links the physical and social environment in relation to community readiness to support the public participation of persons with a disability. Results of a recent community-based program of research in the USA that developed and tested measures of community receptivity to people with a physical mobility limitation are reported. Implications of this research are discussed together with suggestions for future research.
This paper asks, in the context of recent legislative changes, what can be done to support more citizens in England and Wales with learning disabilities to vote in national elections? This issue is addressed through (i) a review of recent disability access campaigns that have reported discrimination against, and the under‐representation of, adults with disabilities in UK elections; (ii) a review of recent research undertaken in the USA into the assessment of competence to vote and research undertaken in England that conclusively documents the under‐representation of voters with learning disabilities in the 2005 general election. It is proposed that a ‘functional approach’ to developing an individual's capacity to vote could help to fulfil Article 29 of the United Nations' Convention on the rights of persons with disabilities that gives all people the same political rights.
The diffusion and use of digitally based information and communication technologies (ICTs) offers the opportunity to redefine and reconceptualize 'community' both in terms of delineating the boundaries of community, as well as the modes of communication used between members. The creation of an electronic infrastructure, the Internet, permits the possibility of widespread public communication that is inexpensive and relatively easy to access. A second consequence builds on the first; the emergence of (virtual) communities based on geographically distributed sources of information production and exchange rather than the geographic proximity of community members to one another. An assessment of three cases of ICT-linked communities suggests that one component of sustainability of these virtual communities of interest may be a geographic linkage. While interests not based on geography are, at least at present, more transitory and less important than those created by the use of the Internet and similar kinds of ICTs. While we may join a virtual community because of an interest we have, unless that interest affects us in our daily lives, in our lives as physically-instantiated and geographically-centred individuals and citizens, there is no good reason to believe that we will long continue an active membership in the virtual community. Indeed, this is precisely what the three case studies presented in this paper suggest.
Under the global pressure of information technology, the adoption of web-based technologies in public administration has created a new government-and-citizen interface. However, whether e-government will unambiguously lead to a more transparent, interactive, open and hence, accountable, government remains a central question. Applying a framework of global pressure effects on bureaucratic change, this paper conducts an empirical study on website openness and accountability in fourteen countries. Even when overall accountability levels rise, the accountability gap between different national bureaucracies often remains intact as web-based technologies typically maintain or reinforce the existing practices. The question of whether e-government promotes accountability depends on what kind of bureaucracy one is referring to in the first place. In the current debate about global convergence and national divergence on the effect of globalization on public bureaucracies, the spread of e-government provides a case of convergence in practice rather than in results.
Recent scholarship shows that social capital has a large influence on political behavior. Social capital’s definition includes trust, norms of reciprocity, and social networks. Most studies, however, ignore the networking component. Here, we test the influence of social networks on political participation using new Japanese survey data. We separately test the effects of involvement in formally organized voluntary associations and informal social networks. We also examine whether hierarchical networks have a different impact on participation than equal relationships. To determine if networks with bridging or bonding social capital affect participation differently, we also measure the openness to outsiders of these networks. Negative binomial regression models indicate a strong positive relationship between formal and informal social networking—including network hierarchy and some forms of openness—and political participation.
Recently national, state, and local governments from many countries have been attempting to reform their administrative structure,
processes, and regulatory frameworks. E-government can be seen as a powerful approach for government administrative reform.
The dynamics and evolution of e-government is a complex process resulting from strategic behavior, development of rules and
standards, and appropriation of those rules and standards by the international community. The purpose of this paper is to
present a theoretical and analytical framework that explains how this e-government evolution has taken place. Based on a literature
review about the study of rules and principles from both institutional and principal-agent theories, a dynamic feedback-rich
model is developed and a number of lessons are presented and discussed.
Scholars investigating the relationship between the Internet and social capital have been stymied by a series of obstacles, some due to theoretical frameworks handed down unchanged from television research, and some due to the lack of an appropriate yardstick. For example, the social interactions that occur through television are prima facie different from those that occur online. Given this basic functional difference, we cannot approach social capital research in an online era with the same set of assumptions and measures. To address this gap in the literature and in our measurement toolkits, this article reports on the development and validation of the Internet Social Capital Scales, or ISCS. These scales are intended to measure two different types of social capital—known as “bridging” and “bonding”—for both online and offline contexts. Question items are developed and tested and found to be valid and psychometrically sound. Potential uses of the scales are then discussed.
Because of the aging society, web accessibility will become more important, especially for the disabled people. Even though efforts have been made to reduce the informational gap resulting from web inaccessibility, websites from virtually every type of organization have major accessibility problems. This study used an automated software tool to evaluate the accessibility of four Korean government and four US government websites. The web accessibility problems found were manually verified by both human experts and an assistive technology. Results were compared between the Korean and the US government websites and between the websites published in 2004 and 2007. Finally, how much accessibility of the Korean and the US government websites has improved during 2004–2007, common web accessibility problems, and potential errors from the automated software tool are discussed.
Community psychology has historically focused on understanding individual behavior in sociocultural context, assessing high-impact contexts, and working in and with communities to improve their resources and influence over their futures. This review adopts an ecological perspective on recent developments in the field, beginning with philosophy of science and progressing through a series of substantive research and intervention domains that characterize current work. These domains include research on the ecology of lives, the assessment of social settings and their impact on behavior, culture and diversity as expressed in the community research process, and community intervention.
We evaluate access for people with disabilities in two Canadian federal government eConsultations — the development of its Innovation Strategy and as part of the Parliamentary sub-Committee on People with Disabilities consultations around the Canada Pension Plan — Disability hearings. From qualitative interviews with government and the disability community as well analysis of key documents, we illustrate what worked in ensuring access for Canadians with disabilities and what served to create additional barriers to access. We suggest, first, that accessibility is not the same thing as usability and requires meeting, at minimum, commonly held standards of access. Secondly, we argue that access is not enough to bring people with disabilities into eConsultations. Proactive measures to reach people experiencing a wide spectrum of disabilities are essential to "enfranchising" people with disabilities in eDemocracy. Addressing both access and inclusion are simply good public policy, not extraordinary measures to address a minority population.
This chapter presents the results of an examination of the current state of U.S. municipal wireless network design and policies with regards to people with disabilities. A survey and comparative analysis was undertaken of a sample of 48 municipalities to ascertain, (1) the accessibility of municipal wireless networks, and (2) the impact of external policy instruments, in this case the U.S. Department of Justice’s Project Civic Access (PCA), on network accessibility. Results suggest that the existence of external accessibility policy mechanisms, while positively associated with some sensitivity towards disadvantaged populations, does not seem to extend general awareness to individuals with disabilities. The authors conclude that although these cities have entered into accessibility compliance agreements, they are not necessarily going beyond the specific scope of the agreement, and they often overlook components of the “digital divide” within their communities.
In autumn 2003 we contracted to undertake a study in two district council areas of ways in which they could meet their Local Public Service Agreement (LPSA) targets in respect of disabled people returning to work. We undertook a literature review of barriers to work, interviewed a number of people involved in working with unemployed people and a number of disabled people in these areas. All the employment organisations we had contact with were working to an individual model of disability and the need to change their orientation became the central recommendation of the first phase of this study. This was rejected by those funding the study. At the end of the first year none of the organisations active in this area was able to identify a single disabled person who had returned to work as a result of their help. We conclude that central government policies are doing little to change the perception of the employment needs of disabled people within local government.
The notion of ‘citizenship’ has become a popular slogan of governments who espouse a commitment to democratic ideals. Such discourse tends to emphasise responsibilities with little serious significance being given to the question of rights. In this paper we explore the continual discrimination which disabled people experience and which militates against the realisation of meaningful citizenship. The struggle for citizenship is viewed as an affirmation of the value of choice, independent and control which disabled people conceive in terms of human rights.
This article seeks to explore the role of the Internet in enhancing democratic local governance. The article suggests that the unique role of elected local authorities is under threat both because of declining levels of citizen participation as well as the transformation of the structure of local government into a system of local governance. In this context, local government can use the Internet to enhance its relations with citizens and to protect its unique position in the broad governance structure. The Internet enables the local authorities to open new channels of participation and actively encourages citizens to use these channels to participate. However, the Internet is not being exploited to its full potential. Likewise, not all authorities are benefiting from the Internet to the same extent. The article suggests that there are variations between local authorities and attempts to explain this variation drawing on concepts from new institutional theory and empirical evidence collected at three local authorities in Britain.
Today, access to information and communication technologies (ICTs) plays an essential role in economic and social development. Accelerated change in the introduction of ICT-enabled solutions can potentially transform all aspects of society, work, business and government. E-technologies and ICT-enabled solutions bring about new forms of governance in the public sector. It is evident that the Internet and Web-based technologies have both had a profound effect on the ways in which the public sector functions. This article examines the effectiveness and the value of digital government as a strategic tool for public management reform. It addresses differing views and perceptions of the implications of digital government; elaborates on the ‘digital divide’ and its impact on the success of digital government; and outlines the results of a preliminary study of the effectiveness of a digital local government initiative.
The author argues that contemporary digital information communication technologies (ICTs) facilitate new forms of e-government-enabled public sector policy making that enshrine some of the important norms and practices of e-democracy. The potential for linking e-democracy in civil society with e-government at the level of the local and national state is far from straightforward but nevertheless achievable. Following a consideration of the democratization effects of e-democracy and e-government, the author outlines how their norms and practices are converging in four principal areas: online consultations integrating civil societal groups with bureaucracies and legislatures, the internal democratization of the public sector itself, the involvement of users in the design and delivery of public services, and the diffusion of open-source collaboration in public organizations. These now feature as some of the core areas for research in this field and our broader understanding of how ICTs are reshaping governance, the state, and democracy.
This article surveys contemporary macro social, economic and political issues and considers how they define the context of life for people with intellectual disability in the early 21st century. It suggests that processes associated with globalisation intensify the agenda of neo‐liberalism to fundamentally determine their everyday social arrangements and experiences, at least in western democracies such as the USA, the UK and Australia. Risk has now emerged as an overarching principle informing social responses to intellectual disability, while marketisation and privatisation have given rise to a complex dynamic whereby demands for individualism have become interconnected with states of dependency. Emerging technologies of citizenship have seen paradoxical notions of choice, consent, needs and interests applied to people with intellectual disability. These new forms of governance pose personal challenges at an individual level and political challenges to the collective of self‐advocacy in its project for change in a globalising world.
English
This article develops a framework of citizenship, in the light of current developments in social theory, policy and practice, to analyse the social rights and duties of disabled citizens in the UK. It looks at the complex interplay between disabled people's roles as carers, cared-for, workers and employers, by moving the debate on from seeing disabled people as the passive recipients of care to seeing them as active citizens. It asks whether developments in policy, such as the growing use of direct payments, can support disabled people in their struggle to avoid social exclusion and be treated as full citizens.
English
This article discusses the rules of the game in participatory democracy and the engagement of disabled people and mental health service users/survivors in the process. Drawing on theories of new social movements and of deliberative democracy, the article considers how notions of ‘legitimate participants’ are constructed within official discourse, and how those can be challenged by autonomous groups of disabled people. It also explores assumptions about appropriate forms of deliberation within participation forums and how an appeal to rational debate can exclude the emotional content of the experience of living with mental health problems from deliberation about mental health policy. The argument is illustrated by reference to research conducted by the author, and by a Canadian study of user/survivor involvement in policy making.
Observations were conducted in three county councils to find out whether the government’s ambition to develop Learning Disability Partnership Boards (as expressed in the White Paper Valuing people) are being realized. All the partnerships practiced various inclusive activities in order to involve people with learning disabilities in public service strategies. However, there appeared to be limited opportunities for citizens to be involved in recommendations or decision‐making for their area. This concurs with other research elsewhere on the involvement of citizens in state provision, i.e. public participation in civic affairs remains in the control of public sector managers. The lack of opportunities for citizens to direct the allocation of resources and strategies at a local level, regardless of their ability to process information, emphasises the limits of New Labour’s citizen–public sector partnerships.
The Disabled People’s Movement (DPM) in the UK rejects the view that disability is an illness. For the DPM it is the social processes of discrimination and oppression that create the material circumstances out of which solidarity and politicisation arise. The DPM has also been shy about impairment, arguing that it is generally irrelevant to the issue of disability and that a clear distinction between impairment and disability is necessary if disability is to be understood as a basis for identity politics. The biological citizens that support embodied health movements use impairment, genetic status, biomedical diagnosis and classification as calling cards that signal their claims to identity. Whilst the DPM has challenged medical hegemony and scientific ideas, many ‘biosocial’ groups embrace the specialised medical and scientific knowledge associated with their ‘condition’, particularly where it might be used to enhance their claims to citizenship. This paper argues that disability activism in the UK is bifurcating. It addresses the difference in perspective and action between the ‘social model stalwarts’ of the DPM and biological citizens that organise politically around particular diagnostic labels.
Can a more collaborative form of public management correct for the historical link between social and economic status (SES) and political participation? New initiatives to involve the citizen directly in public decision making—citizen governance—aim to include a wider representation of groups in society because they draw from service users and seek to recruit hard-to-reach groups. To test the claim that citizen governance may be more representative than other acts of political participation, this essay reports data from the 2005 English and Welsh Citizenship Survey. Using descriptive statistics and regression analysis, it finds evidence that citizen governance is more representative than civic activities, especially for young people and ethnic minority communities. Policy makers can fine-tune their interventions to reach underrepresented groups without believing the citizen governance is a panacea for long-running biases in civic participation.
Political efficacy is a widely studied phenomenon and an important predictor of political participation, but little is known about the political efficacy of the millions of people with disabilities in the United States. This paper reports the results of a nationally representative telephone survey of 1,240 people—stratified to include 700 people with disabilities—following the November 1998 elections. Several measures of efficacy that help predict political activity were found to be significantly lower among people with disabilities than among otherwise similar people without disabilities. Although lower levels of internal efficacy and civic skills could largely be explained by educational and employment gaps, lower levels of other variables (external efficacy, perceived influence of people with disabilities, and perceived treatment of people with disabilities) remained after applying a wide range of controls, indicating that people with disabilities are less likely to see the political system as responsive to them. This perception is concentrated among non–employed people with disabilities. The lower efficacy levels linked to “disability gaps” in employment, income, education, and group attendance appear to account for as much as half of the disability political participation gap; hence, policies intended to increase employment and educational opportunities for people with disabilities have potentially important political effects.
Background Typically people with intellectual disability have small, highly restricted social networks characterized by interactions with other people with intellectual disabilities, family members, and paid workers. The goal of ‘inclusion’ has been central to policies that have shaped services over the past 30 years. It is an ill defined concept with disagreement about its meaning, the problems it seeks to overcome and how it should be realized.
Method Ethnographic and action research methods were used to support and collect data on the implementation of a programme, known as the Community Inclusion Framework, in a group home for five adults with severe intellectual disabilities in Victoria, Australia.
Results and Conclusions A pattern of service delivery based on community presence rather than participation evolved and endured over 16 months. The findings show that most staff attached a different meaning to inclusion from that proposed in the Community Inclusion Framework, disagreed with the proposed meaning or felt these residents were too different for it to be meaningful. This suggests that priority will only be accorded to activities that lead to inclusion if staff are convinced of the veracity of this and given strong and consistent direction and support.
At the beginning of the twenty-first century, the challenge to governments is to improve citizens’ trust in governments. The Internet aids good governance by increasing transparency and customer-oriented service delivery. During the last few years, European Union local governments have expanded their presence on the Internet. This article presents empirical evidence on the nature of e-governance initiatives in cities across Europe. The findings could be of interest to cities interested in determining how their online presence compares with that of other cities. There are opportunities for information and communication technologies (ICT) to enhance governance in local governments, but the focus of the ICT applications concentrates technologies on the management and delivery of services rather than on other areas. The Internet is not yet running as an effective medium facilitating democratic inputs into the policymaking process. Our study shows that technology is behaving as an enabler within preexisting social and political structures.
The Internet provides individuals with disabilities numerous tools to live independently. In the convenience of the home, a person can access an abundance of information, an electronic community, updates on the latest disability advocacy news, education through distance-learning classes, and on-line shopping for books, clothes, assistive technology, and a host of other consumer goods. Centers for Independent Living (CILs) are consumer-run, non-profit grassroots disability service organizations at the forefront of the disability rights movement. Providing services to individuals across the range of disabilities, CILs have begun to use the Internet as a complement to their traditional service delivery methods. This article examines the emerging trend of independent living services on the web. The investigation examines 200 CIL Internet sites across the United States during the period of April to August 2001. Information is collected and analyzed about how CILs are using the Internet to provide their services and programs. In addition, the article examines the technological accessibility of their web sites. Implications of the findings for CILs, consumers with disabilities, and disability policy are examined. Copyright © 2003 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Information and communications technologies have become an integral part of life in an information society, affecting employment, education and many other daily activities. For individuals with disabilities, equal access to telecommunications remains a concern, as many technologies that are developed do not allow for equal access. Law and policy have made significant progress in some nations, but sizeable barriers remain to the social inclusion of individuals with disabilities in telecommunications technologies and services. This paper examines the importance of equal access to telecommunications for individuals with disabilities in both the formulation and the implementation of policy. Analyzing issues of policy and implementation, this paper discusses policy questions and potential areas of research to better understand the relationship of telecommunications policy to access for persons with disabilities.
The current literature on Information and Communication Technology (ICT) and planning suggests that the use of Information Technology (IT) in local government can enhance the management and functioning of cities. Of particular interest is the phenomenon of e-government, where debates and information surrounding local government matters are conducted in cyberspace. Of relevance also, are the networking opportunities that the Internet can facilitate between city governments and the institutional learning that can emanate from that. The increasing use of web-based Geographic Information Systems (GIS) applications raises awareness of spatial issues that impact on defined municipal areas, whilst interactive mapping provides opportunities for addressing spatial concerns virtually. Most of the literature does, however, focus on the experience of developed countries where capacity and resources permit a sophisticated understanding of ICT. Yet, evidence suggests that these tools are also used in some developing countries, with India often cited as one of the leading countries in achieving ICT prominence, but little seems to be published about this experience in Southern Africa. There are a number of innovative initiatives underway in South African local governments but most of these interventions are in their infancy. In contrast, there are a number of examples in developed countries that may provide some guidance for developing cities. This paper examines the Smart City initiative in Brisbane in Australia, and compares it with moves currently underway in Durban, South Africa to incorporate ICT in local governance. The intention is to expose the differences in approach, understand the capacity and resource issues that may impact, and draw some conclusions with regards to future interventions in Durban. Overall, the paper provides an initial conceptual landscape that begins to determine the extent to which ICT in local government can provide opportunities for Durban by learning from the experience of Brisbane, Australia.
Websites do not become usable just because their content is accessible. For people who are blind, the application of the W3C's Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) often might not even make a significant difference in terms of efficiency, errors or satisfaction in website usage. This paper documents the development of nine guidelines to construct an enhanced text user interface (ETI) as an alternative to the graphical user interface (GUI). An experimental design with 39 blind participants executing a search and a navigation task on a website showed that with the ETI, blind users executed the search task significantly faster, committing fewer mistakes, rating it significantly better on subjective scales as well as when compared to the GUIs from other websites they had visited. However, performance did not improve with the ETI on the navigation task, the main reason presumed to be labeling problems. We conclude that the ETI is an improvement over the GUI, but that it cannot help in overcoming one major weakness of most websites: If users do not understand navigation labels, even the best user interface cannot help them navigate.
Governments in many countries require that government Web content adhere to international accessibility standards, in addition
to specific national standards. The Web Content Accessibility Guidelines (WCAG) version 2.0 will set a new standard for Web
accessibility. The implications of WCAG 2.0 for eGovernment sites in two nations, the United States of America and Australia,
are considered. While the needs of all users are important when determining accessibility and usability requirements of sites,
the particular needs of people with cognitive impairments are considered in greater detail, as an example to designers that
people with disabilities are a heterogeneous group, where one solution does not fit all.
Very little is known about the online habits of people labelled with intellectual disability. What little information there is focuses more on demographic descriptors rather than any analyses of issues specific to that group. Hence the vast majority of the literature is firmly focused on more generic issues as they affect the general population. Some very few disability dedicated studies, however, have examined homepages maintained by individuals who live with Down syndrome. Here at least is evidence of a field of inquiry that recognises there may be particular aspects of web based communications that deserve special interest. The dynamics of web based communications are fast moving and the relatively static homepage has subsequently given way to Web 2.0 technologies. Here the recent and exponential increase in the popularity of blogging as a means of mass communication has attracted much comment in both popular and specialist quarters. Its ease of use and near universal availability has prompted massive sociological inquiry. But again the profile of people living with intellectual disability is absent from the debate. Our study reports on a project in which adults with intellectual disability were assisted to access the web in general, and the 'blogosphere' in particular. Our focus is on the means and methods by which the participants were able to manage their off and online identities. We look at the language employed, the layouts used and the way the online messages and postings reflected or distorted the actual lived experiences of these proto-bloggers. Notions of authorship and audience also contribute to the debate as these issues raise questions about sense of self, disability as a cultural construct and our ability to negotiate the increasingly important virtual world of the web.
In recent years there has been significant debate regarding the potential of participatory forms of governance to engage with diverse groups and the ‘politics of difference’. This paper explores these debates in the context of disabled people’s engagement in urban policy processes, as an arena in which participative imperatives have become manifest under the UK’s New Labour government. Drawing on a case study of a Single Regeneration Budget partnership, I argue that there are significant limits to disabled people’s engagement in urban policy, ranging from their perceived legitimacy and constitution as a ‘relevant public’, through to the processes of partnership in which managerialist objectives clash with participative agendas. The paper therefore raises issues about the rationale for participation and the extent to which notions of deliberative democracy are equipped to deal with issues of ‘difference’.
With the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) the World Health Organization (WHO) has prepared the ground for a comprehensive understanding of Human Functioning and Rehabilitation Research integrating the biomedical perspective on impairment with the social model of disability. This poses a number of old and new challenges regarding the enhancement of adequate research capacity. Here the authors will summarize approaches to address these challenges with respect to three areas: the organization of Human Functioning and Rehabilitation Research into distinct scientific fields, the development of suitable academic training programs and the building of university centres and collaboration networks.
We investigated the task processes which hinder people with intellectual disabilities (ID) when using the human-computer interface. This involved testing performance on specific computer tasks and conducting detailed analyses of the task demands imposed on the participants. The interface used by Internet Explorer (IE) was standardized into 16 tasks (161 subtasks). A total of 57 people with ID completed all the tasks. The task demands of each subtask were analyzed and rated by an expert panel review. Results indicated that the 16 identified tasks to have varied levels of difficulty. Participants' performances were differentiated by two tasks: general motor functions and use customized bookmark. The majority of the tasks required visual acuity, vigilance, orientation, and basic sensori-motor abilities. The more difficult tasks were associated with higher levels of working memory and recognition of Chinese words. The model of identification, response, and execution was useful for analyzing the IE tasks. Successful IE performances appeared to be determined by the match between the participants' abilities and the task demands. The findings shed light on the use of task-specific screening tests and on the design of ability-specific training programs that enhance the computer competency of people with ID.
Disabilities and e-learning problems and solutions: An exploratory study
- C Fitchen
- V Ferraro
- J Asuncion
- C Chowjka
- M Barile
- M Nguyen
- R Klomp
- J Wolforth
Teleworking and the digital divide
- J. C.Bricout
Federal, State, and Local Governments
- U S Census
Disability, new technology and the redefinition of space-opportunities and challenges.
- A.Roulstone