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Critical theory and Independent Living explores the intersections between contemporary critical theory and disabled people's struggle for self-determination. The book sheds new light on the Independent Living movement - an influential yet undertheorised and often misrepresented new social movement. The analysis highlights the affinities between the insights of Independent Living advocates and prominent studies of epistemic injustice, biopower and psychopower, uncovering the contributions that Independent Living activism can make to contemporary critical theorising.
The book focuses on the engagement of Independent Living thinking and practice with critiques of welfare-state paternalism, neoliberal marketisation and familialism. It develops a comprehensive assessment of the three organising principles of social welfare - the state, the market and the family - in view of their impact on disabled people's self-determination. On this basis, the analysis highlights the successes and failures of the Independent Living movement in various welfare regimes - liberal, social-democratic, conservative, and post/socialist. The result is a pioneering cross-regime comparison grounded in Independent Living activism.
Critical theory and Independent Living draws on the work of the European Network on Independent Living (ENIL), a Europe-wide advocacy organisation led and controlled by disabled people. Case studies of ENIL's struggles for epistemic justice, campaigns for deinstitutionalisation and advocacy for personal assistance evidence the critical-theoretical contributions of Independent Living. These efforts help rethink independence as a form of interdependence - a reframing that is pivotal for critical theorising in contemporary society.
About the author
Teodor Mladenov is a Senior Lecturer in the School of Humanities, Social Sciences and Law at the University of Dundee
