The development of the Cypriot Disability Movement: A preliminary theoretical model

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The development of the Cypriot Disability
MovementA preliminary theoretical model

• Simoni Symeonidou
• PhD Candidate
• University of Cambridge

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Cyprus

• Geographical information
• Mediterranean island, Population 775,000
• 85 Greek-Cypriots, 12 Turkish-Cypriots and 3
  foreign residents
• Political information
• Long period of foreign sovereignty
• 1960 Cyprus Republic
• 1974 Turkish invasion, occupation of 38 of the
  island, two communities live separately
• 2004 Cyprus becomes a member of the European
  Union

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My inspirations

• Cambell, J. and Oliver, M. (1996) Disability
  Politics. Understanding our past changing our
  future. London Routledge
• Lack of research about disability issues in
  Cyprus
• British Literature on Disability Studies

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Goals of the Study

• Conceptualise the development of the
  Cypriot Disability Movement by locating it
  in a changing historical context
• and
• by interpreting disabled activists understanding
  of their experiences, both as disabled people and
  as disabled activists within the disability
  movement

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History and Disability Studies

• The Historian aims to reconstruct the past
• Understanding the past gives a sense of
  self-appreciation,
• Past illuminates the present and helps planning
  the future
• Past reveals events that acted as turning
  points
• The Disability Studies Researcher aims to
  research topics of interest within the field
• The development role of disability movements
• The personal experience of disability
• Issues of culture, identity and gender

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Hermeneutics as a useful tool

• Ontology and Epistemology
• There is no real and objective truth
• The aim is to understand what is being researched
  by providing the best possible interpretation
• Methods of data collection
• Oral history interviews as the primary source
• Respondents construct their personal stories
• Researcher interprets respondents
  interpretations
• Documents as a complementary source

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Methodology

• Population All Greek-Cypriot disabled activists
  who have been members of the movement any time
  during the period 1966-2003
• Sample 16 key-disabled activists who met the
  criteria
• Sampling difficulties Including women in the
  sample
• Data Collection
• 1st phase Documentary material
• 2nd phase First round of oral history interviews
• 3rd phase Preliminary analysis and new sample
• 4th phase Second round of oral history
  interviews
• Democratic character of the research

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Data Analysis

• Cultural and Materialist understanding of the
  Cypriot Context and disabled peoples oppression
• The personal experience of disability
• The development of the Cypriot Disability
  Movement
• The political experience of disability

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Cultural context and disabled peoples oppression

• Dominance of Greek Ideals
• Impact of Greek ideals to Western cultures
• Impact of Greek ideals in Cyprus is stronger
• A healthy body inhabits a healthy mind
• Power of Christian Values and Church
• Importance of Religion as a means to maintain
  national cultural existence because of
  sovereignty
• Bible examples showing that disabled people were
  cured disabled person should be cured
  
• Christian tradition of Charity
• State and Church did not separate their roles
  Unequal battle between Human Rights
  and Charity

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Cultural context and disabled peoples oppression

• Dominance of charitable values
• Charitable values have been cultivated over the
  years
• Fund-raising by companies, special schools
  boards and disability organisations
• Power of family
• Family strong institution that undertook states
  role
• Family supports and demands support in exchange
• Families find it difficult to accept disabled
  child/adult

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Cultural context and disabled peoples oppression

• Power of national identity
• A group of privileged disabled people heroes
• Disabled fighters (1955-1959 National Liberation
  Struggle)
• Disabled of the war (1974 Turkish Invasion)
• Impairment discourse Vs Disability discourse
• Disabled people presented as passive and pitiful
• Use of alternative terminology
• Oppressive articles and photos published in the
  press

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Materialist understandings of disabled peoples
oppression

• Impact of Western materialist thinking
• Disability was linked with inability to work
• Rise of traditional professions
• Rise of medical model
• Normalising principles
• Belief that impairment should be cured
• Institutionalisation

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The personal experience of disability

• Education
• Feeling imprisoned in the boarding school
• I wanted to leave from the first day. At the
  beginning, my mom stayed with me for a few days
  until I get used to the School. They were trying
  to deceive me. My mothers knotted hand was
  different from my teachers hand. They couldnt
  deceive me. While my mother was holding my hand
  she would change with my teacher who was trying
  to talk to me nicely. I felt imprisoned from the
  very first day. I always had disagreements
  and conflicts with the teachers and students, I
  used to talk students into escaping (we both
  laugh). This shows how I felt. I was organising
  movements and revolutions. That was natural. It
  was a restricting environment. I couldnt do
  everything according to the schedule and I
  couldnt accept others deciding what time I would
  eat, go to bed, or watch t.v. You can accept
  school, but you cant accept to be there all the
  time. C.Nicolaides

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The personal experience of disability

• Employment
• People with sensory impairments were usually
  trained for traditional professions
• Only a few managed to have University education
  (exceptions used as examples)
• Difficulties in being employed (employers bias)
• People with acquired impairments employed in
  posts that help them come to terms with
  disability

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The personal experience of disability

• Response to disability
• Accident as a turning point to life trajectory
• I had just graduated and I had two scholarships
  for Neurosurgery and Medicine. I did my military
  service in the National Guard. Two months before
  finishing my military service, it was Wednesday
  after Easter and we were in a lorry of the army,
  six persons, we returned from Dali to Nicosia. A
  taxi tried to overtake, a car came from the
  opposite direction, the driver of the taxi was on
  a turninh and he had no visibility. We were six
  persons, fortunately, only I paid the bride. I
  knew what happened because I used to read and I
  began to say that I was paralysed. Instead of
  entering the door as a doctor, I entered it from
  the side of the patient. A. Procopiou
• Developing illnesses act as transitional periods
• The person feels in the middle of two worlds

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The personal experience of disability

• Family
• Supporting ones family instead of being
  supported
• Importance of mothers response
• Access in social life
• Prior the 1980s disabled people were
  invisible
• Personal journeys to social integration

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The personal experience of disability

• Gendered experience of disability
• Womens double oppression is related with their
  difficulties in getting married
• Intimate relationships
• Only men referred to this dimension
• Being loved accepted Vs Being loved rejected
• Belief that non-disabled women feel pressure from
  their families to end relationships

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Development of the Cypriot Disability Movement

• 1966 The first disability organisation
• We focussed in finding members for our
  organisation. It was very difficult. Now we
  have telephone. Then it was different. We
  worked in regions. For example, the Regional
  Committee of Limassol would cover a few villages
  every Sunday. We found disabled people and we
  registered them. We used to plough Cyprus to
  find disabled people. This went on for a few
  years. We collected data. We registered all the
  disabled people we could find and others who were
  pointed out by community leaders. We made a list
  with all the relevant information. We worked as
  statisticians. G.Christoforou
• 1980 Formation of single impairment
  organisations
• Our fate in our hands, Nothing about us
  without us

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Development of the Cypriot Disability Movement

• By being united you have power
• 1981 - International Year of Disabled People
• 1984 Confederatio19n of Organisations of the
• Disabled of Cyprus
• 1986 - Co-ordinating Committee for the Struggle
• of the Disabled
• 1999 - Cyprus Confederation of Organisations of
• the Disabled

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The political experience of disability

• 1980s Experience in single-impairment groups
• Dilemma of solving personal problems by using
  their connections or through their organisations
• States attitude was disappointing
• Inexistent social policy. Impact of networks
  with disabled activists from other countries
• Scattered legislative achievements for each group
  of disabled people - no sense of collectiveness

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The political experience of disability

• Experience in single-impairment organisations
• Conflicts as turning points
• The good boy policy
• Charity experiences unavoidable humiliation?
• Disappointment of the states generosity to the
  heroic group of disabled people
• Self evaluation of the first generation of
  activists as members of single-impairment groups
• We belong to a generation that had an
  obligation to join the organisations struggle.
  We had to create the infrastructure that we have
  today. New generations found the infrastructure
  ready M. Demosthenous

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The political experience of disability

• Experience in collective organisations
• Activists in a big school
• Getting to know people with different kinds of
  impairments
• Lack of agreement on the meaning of equity
• Some activists found it difficult to function in
  collective organisations (personality, age,
  gender)
• Personal, group and collective identity

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• CCOD had an impact on me. As soon as I started
  going to the meetings, I realised that I had to
  become active. At the beginning, I used to go
  there and just listen. There were old activists
  who carried disappointment and anger. This anger
  is important for claiming your rights. There is
  no doubt that it helped me a lot. Only men
  participated. The only woman was the interpreter
  of sign language for Demos. In addition, I was
  young. I also look young. I just listened. I
  felt that there wasnt a single hole for me to
  enter. You needed to be methodical in order to
  be imposed, but I felt that I could help and
  reinforce the struggle of CCOD in another way.
  Finally, I found the way. Through this office, I
  am in close contact with the organisation. It is
  very important to know your possibilities and
  capabilities, to know how you function and to
  know what you can really do and how far you can
  go.

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• There is no reason to hit your head on the
  wall or throw eggs on the wall because the
  others do so and that way they achieve things.
  If you dont help yourself, if you dont see
  whats best for you, you cant do anything. It
  is through your own needs that you can do things
  for the benefit of other people. If you dont
  support yourself on your own, if you dont help
  yourself, then there isnt much you can do. This
  is not selfishness. It is the right attitude
  towards the situation. It needs obstinacy a lot
  of obstinacy. If you are obstinate, then you can
  achieve something. If you let yourself lose,
  then you cant achieve anything. You have to
  push things. It is disappointing, very
  disappointing. But this is how it is in Cyprus.
  
• C. Petridou

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The political experience of disability

• Experience in collective organisations
• Disabled activists in search of moulds
• Efforts to find out about social policy abroad
• Umbrella organisation member to international and
  European organisations
• Accession to the European Union gives hope
• Close bonds with the Greek disability movement

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The political experience of disability

• Experience in collective organisations
• Disabled activists are disappointed with the
  state
• Lack of vision and long-term planning of the
  state
• Marginalisation of disabled activists by the
  state
• State as breakwater
• State stops protests

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• The development of the
• Cypriot Disability Movement
• A preliminary theoretical model

Culture
The personal experience of disability
The political experience of disability