Participation, Legal Capacity, and Gender: Reflections from the United Nations Partnership on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Project in Serbia
The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) establishes that people with disabilities shall enjoy their human rights on an equal basis with others. Those rights include the right to legal capacity and to protection against discrimination, including intersectional...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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MDPI AG
2023-03-01
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| Series: | Disabilities |
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| Online Access: | https://www.mdpi.com/2673-7272/3/1/10 |
| _version_ | 1797612437560623104 |
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| author | Holly Wescott Delia Ferri Malcolm MacLachlan |
| author_facet | Holly Wescott Delia Ferri Malcolm MacLachlan |
| author_sort | Holly Wescott |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) establishes that people with disabilities shall enjoy their human rights on an equal basis with others. Those rights include the right to legal capacity and to protection against discrimination, including intersectional and multiple forms of discrimination on the basis of disability and gender. In an effort to support the realisation of the CRPD, the United Nations team in Serbia undertook a project to address the implementation of these rights under the UN Partnership on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNPRPD) programme. Namely, by bringing together stakeholders from the UN, government and civil society, the UNPRPD project in Serbia sought to create structural changes to uphold the rights of people with disabilities. With a view of understanding the process of change within, rather than the outcomes of, this UPRPD project, twenty-eight semi-structured interviews were conducted using the Most Significant Change Technique (MSCT) with key stakeholders involved in such a project. The interviews were analysed using Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) to preserve the unique and diverse perspectives of participants who had differing roles across the project. The analysis allowed us to identify a number of facets of the process that facilitate structural change: coalition-building events; strengthening stakeholder capacity and relationships; the participation of persons with disabilities; and innovation in terms of what made the project significant, novel and in itself a change. All these facets are discussed in this article, with the purpose of supporting global efforts in alignment with the CRPD. On the whole, this article aims to support a better understanding of disability-inclusive development projects in line with the CRPD and to give evidence on how countries may begin to tackle the structural exclusion of persons with disabilities in society. |
| first_indexed | 2024-03-11T06:41:13Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-d0376de1137f4f1bab50ef3cc8f40b2b |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2673-7272 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-03-11T06:41:13Z |
| publishDate | 2023-03-01 |
| publisher | MDPI AG |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Disabilities |
| spelling | doaj.art-d0376de1137f4f1bab50ef3cc8f40b2b2023-11-17T10:36:10ZengMDPI AGDisabilities2673-72722023-03-013112914610.3390/disabilities3010010Participation, Legal Capacity, and Gender: Reflections from the United Nations Partnership on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Project in SerbiaHolly Wescott0Delia Ferri1Malcolm MacLachlan2Department of Psychology, Maynooth University, N91HX32 Maynooth, IrelandAssisting Living and Learning (ALL) Institute, Maynooth University, N91HX32 Maynooth, IrelandDepartment of Psychology, Maynooth University, N91HX32 Maynooth, IrelandThe United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) establishes that people with disabilities shall enjoy their human rights on an equal basis with others. Those rights include the right to legal capacity and to protection against discrimination, including intersectional and multiple forms of discrimination on the basis of disability and gender. In an effort to support the realisation of the CRPD, the United Nations team in Serbia undertook a project to address the implementation of these rights under the UN Partnership on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNPRPD) programme. Namely, by bringing together stakeholders from the UN, government and civil society, the UNPRPD project in Serbia sought to create structural changes to uphold the rights of people with disabilities. With a view of understanding the process of change within, rather than the outcomes of, this UPRPD project, twenty-eight semi-structured interviews were conducted using the Most Significant Change Technique (MSCT) with key stakeholders involved in such a project. The interviews were analysed using Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis (IPA) to preserve the unique and diverse perspectives of participants who had differing roles across the project. The analysis allowed us to identify a number of facets of the process that facilitate structural change: coalition-building events; strengthening stakeholder capacity and relationships; the participation of persons with disabilities; and innovation in terms of what made the project significant, novel and in itself a change. All these facets are discussed in this article, with the purpose of supporting global efforts in alignment with the CRPD. On the whole, this article aims to support a better understanding of disability-inclusive development projects in line with the CRPD and to give evidence on how countries may begin to tackle the structural exclusion of persons with disabilities in society.https://www.mdpi.com/2673-7272/3/1/10disabilityCRPDUNPRPDcivil societyUnited Nationslegal capacity |
| spellingShingle | Holly Wescott Delia Ferri Malcolm MacLachlan Participation, Legal Capacity, and Gender: Reflections from the United Nations Partnership on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Project in Serbia Disabilities disability CRPD UNPRPD civil society United Nations legal capacity |
| title | Participation, Legal Capacity, and Gender: Reflections from the United Nations Partnership on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Project in Serbia |
| title_full | Participation, Legal Capacity, and Gender: Reflections from the United Nations Partnership on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Project in Serbia |
| title_fullStr | Participation, Legal Capacity, and Gender: Reflections from the United Nations Partnership on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Project in Serbia |
| title_full_unstemmed | Participation, Legal Capacity, and Gender: Reflections from the United Nations Partnership on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Project in Serbia |
| title_short | Participation, Legal Capacity, and Gender: Reflections from the United Nations Partnership on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Project in Serbia |
| title_sort | participation legal capacity and gender reflections from the united nations partnership on the rights of persons with disabilities project in serbia |
| topic | disability CRPD UNPRPD civil society United Nations legal capacity |
| url | https://www.mdpi.com/2673-7272/3/1/10 |
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