Knowledge, Power and the Disability Discrimination Bill

This article compares the social model of disability with the individual model upon which the Government's Disability Discrimination Bill is based. It uses Foucault's concepts of Power \ Knowledge and Governance, to develop an analysis which illustrates how both models of disability can impact on the identities of disabled people and local government practices. It suggests that, in order to assist disabled people to 'fashion a purpose', those disabled people and their allies working in local government need to operationalise the social model.