Edward Scully

Original Title for Paper:

The Difficulties produced by Cultural and Value Differences when Constructing

Comparative and Evaluative Frameworks in Cross National European programmes

and partnerships

Retitled:

Disabling Europe Through Projects

Paper presented at the European Conference on Educational Research, Edinburgh, 20-23 September 2000

Comparative Education Network

Saturday 23 September

This paper is essentially concerned with explaining how cultural differences between countries on various socio-political issues can manifest themselves in European and Transnational partnerships. The discussion focuses on a cross-European educational and employment partnership between four organisations which work with disabled people. The argument illuminates how different problems for a partnership are created when organisations hold different values and cultures regarding socio-political notions around the concept and working policy of disability. Three areas of contention are discussed in relation to the process of collaborative cross-national research.

The study is based on the movement of a transantional partnership formed under the Horizon programme, which is financed by the European Social Fund to promote and support education and long-term employment for disabled people throughout Europe. This partnership ran between 1998 and 2000, and consisted of four organisations: first, an independent project co-funded by the regional authority which was based in southern France which I will refer to as Languedoc : this project was developing an assessment tool, which took the form of a structured interview and grid of questions, the aim of which was to provide a concise assessment of the next step for the disabled person being assessed, whether this be a job or education. The second project had been intitiated by the regional authority in Cork. The essence of the project was to develop, and then offer Information and Communications Technology applications that would enable greater learning and wider education for under-16s with mobility problems in the south west of Ireland. The third project, for which I was the employed evaluator, was set up by a charitable organisation in Coventry. This was an eighteen month course for ten disabled adults. The course combined adult education and vocational training to train the students to become disability auditors and consultants, specialising in auditing organisations to make sure they comply with the new Disability Discrimination act (1995). Finally there was a project based in Birmingham, again developed by a charitable organisation. This project offered ten week courses to people who had recently acquired physical disabilities, and offered both adult education and vocational training. I was also the employed evaluator for this course.

A stipulation of the European funding for these projects was to form a transnational network. In the bid for the projects, the objectives and benefits that were to be gained from this co-operation were listed, and amongst these were

  • To compare frameworks of policies and practices in member states to identify best practice and to effect changes
  • To enable best practice to be shared across barriers
  • To enable products produced in one agency to be tested and refined in different cultural contexts thus leading to improved products capable of wider application.

By the very nature of the stipulated co-operation, all partners were aware that the collaboration would involve considerable dialogue around the exchanging of ideas and approaches to disability in general. This situation reflected the recent trend in Europe, where integration is no longer occurring solely on an economic platform, but meaningfully occurs on a political and socio-political level also, which by its very nature is subjective.

The meeting I attended to evaluate the transnational partnership was at a week long meeting held in Perpignan, which was attended by representatives from all organisations. I designed the evaluation methodology through a qualitative framework in order to monitor and explore the ambiguities and meanings applied cross-nationally to movements such as general co-operation and mutual learning. The main purpose of the week’s meetings was to co-operate on the assessment grid being produced by Languedoc, evaluate the English translation of it, and help with any further amendments to it. Whilst this co-operation did occur, it was undoubtedly overshadowed by the differences and divergence of standpoints that emerged over the course of the week, which highlighted the different values, ideas and cultures that existed between the groups.

Before the meeting had occurred and the grid had been seen, it was assumed that whilst there would be differences in cultural approaches to disability, they would not be vastly significant. Indeed, the French, the English and Irish are widely regarded as progressive in attitudes towards disability. As Daunt[1] points out in Meeting Disability: a European Response, the earliest innovations in Independent Living and the provision of services for the disabled by the disabled took place in France in the 1960s. The first ever institution for disabled people, le Hotel des Invalides, was opened in Paris in 1674, and the idea of education or re-education of disabled people was a product of eighteenth century enlightenment. The contemporary establishment model in France and official rhetoric hold that policy for disability is progressive, with significant legislation protecting the rights of disabled people, and a junior minister who is in charge of disability issues.

However, difficulties within the partnership occurred before the meeting had actually commenced. The Coventry project had requested that they bring one of their students to their meeting. The project co-ordinator and the student concerned, who had visible and quite significant physical impairments, were planning to develop a consultancy together for auditing organisations to insure they were complying with new disability legislation. It was felt the experience would be beneficial for both the student and for the testing of the assessment tool. Yet, this request was outrightly refused, whilst no reason was given. Subsequently the incident undermined, to some extent, the rationale behind the disability movement.

A weeks series of meetings were set out and devoted primarily to introducing the assessment tool, the grid of questions, to all the partners and subsequent discussion about the tool. From the outset problems emerged in terms of perceptions of the grid.

At the offset it was presumed that the structure of the grid was quite simple. A series of 27 areas of an individuals characteristics, both physical and mental, are set out. Whoever is subject to the grid is graded, by an observer and interviewer, on each of these 27 areas on a score and rating basis. The areas considered vary quite considerably and include topics such as standard of housing, age, level of deficiency/handicap and emotional maturity, all considered by the project as variables that were essential to determine when assessing what types of vocation, occupation or education the subject was suitable for.

Meetings around the grid commenced and it quickly became apparent that discussions and dialogue would not be straightforward. A lot of the discussions essentially entailed representatives of groups whose organisations appeared diametrically opposed in many of their philosophical approaches to the phenomenon of disability and hence their organisational approaches differed. In effect, many of the meetings started to focus around how best to reconcile these approaches. From an early stage during the week it was apparent that I needed to widen the focus of my evaluation from the co-operation of the partnership and the achieved outputs to include the main feature of the meetings; the barriers and obstacles produced for the partnership by the differing values and cultural standpoints held towards disability.

In addition to some technical hurdles regarding the grid that the other projects held, there were essentially three cultural “stumbling blocks” that appeared to prevent ideological approval and convergence about the grid. The first of these was the issue used in the language of both the French version and the English translation. Many approaches in modern social science share the assumption that phenomena are shaped by the ways people communicate about them[2] i.e. they are constituted and constructed through expressive practices. This is not denying their material reality, but emphasizes the processes through which that reality is apprehended. As Michel Foucault put it discourses are “practices that systematically form the objects of which they speak”. Disability activists and academics in the United Kingdom[3] have attributed much to the construction and use of language which complies with modern approaches and models of the phenomena of disability. Throughout the grid language was used which was seen as regressive and anathema to the current model of disability prevalent in the United Kingdom, known widely as the social model of disability, which I will go on to discuss later in this paper. Thus, objections were raised to the use of certain words, most notably invalid and handicap, as both of these words in Britain hold traditionally negative connotations, invalid meaning in-valid or not valid, and handicap being a term derived from when disabled people had to beg for money, with literally their cap in their hand.

During the meetings, the representatives of Languedoc felt it was unnecessary for these changes, considering them merely issues of semantics. In their own cultural context these words were totally acceptable – indeed, the junior minister for disability in France has the word Handicape in their title. However, the English representatives were unable to fully accept such a cultural difference without its socio-political ramifications, and saw their role as to inform the Languedoc project of linguistic best practice in the United Kingdom. This issue remained a stumbling block – whilst much of the language in the English translation was altered, the French version remained the same.

The second cultural stumbling block concerned the involvement of disabled people in the provision of services and construction of products for disabled people. It transpired during the course of discussions that not one disabled person was either employed by the Languedoc project, and no disabled people had been involved in any consultative capacity whilst designing the assessment grid. At one level this came as a surprise as official rhetoric at governmental level advocated a prominent role of disabled people in such a capacity, yet the organisation comprised only of able-bodied people. This was in stark contrast to the English organisations. At another level I reflected on the fact that I was an able-bodied person employed as the disability researcher. However, both the Birmingham and Coventry projects employed disabled people in either project management or teaching capacities. In the United Kingdom, current lottery bid guidelines for an organisation bidding for monies to develop initiatives for disabled people must have a board of trustees (or similar body) at least 50% of whom must be disabled (i.e. service-users). This correlates with certain elements of the Blairite third way agenda, which advocates ‘social entrepreneurs’ to become involved in areas in which they have personal experience, expertise, vested interest and enthusiasm. Thus to find a project for disabled people without disabled people appeared flawed from the English perspective, in that the lack of involvement in developing this tool implied that it may lack knowledge, perspective and considerations from a disabled point of view and may lack credibility. Throughout the meetings this underlying fact was a constant suggestion that the developmental methods for the grid were incomplete.

The third and final cultural difference was based around general philosophical approaches to disability, and this broad cultural difference loosely underpins the difference in language used and the selection of able-bodied or disabled personnel. To demonstrate this difference, I will first briefly outline the two broad theoretical approaches to disability in general and which featured in this partnership. The two generic approaches to disability are known as the Medical model of disability, also referred to as the “tragedy model”, and the social model of disability, also known as the “rights model”. Simply put, the medical model of disability asks “what is wrong with this individual that makes their life so difficult?”, whilst the social model asks “what is wrong with society that makes life so difficult for this individual”?[4] The social model is extremely prominent in the United Kingdom with both academics and activists in a number of forms, and both the Birmingham and Coventry projects feature education on these models as a central plank. However, the assessment grid that had been developed was in essence deeply entrenched in the medical model of disability, and this is somewhat reflected within the earlier points about language and personnel. Essentially, the assessment grid was designed to ascertain suitability for types of employment or education by focussing purely on the individual involved – it classifies characteristics of problems that the individual has, and then locates the problematized individual somewhere within the accepted framework of employment that exists. It did not address questions of the structures or framework of the employment market or society at large, but accepted these as they were and placed people within this and without challenging it, typically limiting disabled people and prescribing them to menial work. This difference in approach was the largest divergence of the groups. The Coventry project felt that the essence of their course was to train people up to ensure that the Disability Discrimination Act was being adhered to: that is, make sure structures within society were being challenged and changed so as to allow everyone equal opportunity. To them, it appeared that the Languedoc project was their antithesis, as their method attached problems experienced to the disabled individual whilst ignoring the contribution of the existing environment: these individuals were then slotted into this environment where it was felt they were suited. For the Coventry project, the problem seemed to lie in the environment; for Languedoc (from the Coventry groups point of view), the problem lay in the individual.

Despite the gulf in approaches, the meetings continued and dialoguing and the exchanging of ideas continued throughout in attempts to reconcile the differing approaches. Some reconciliation of the large different cultural differences that existed occurred as the dialoguing went on. On the part of the Brimingham, Coventry and Cork projects there was a more conscious and concerted effort to assist with the grid in other ways whilst accepting it could not be changed fundamentally to align with a more Social Model approach. This appreciation of cultural diversity and difference of approach gradually led to more technical analysis of the grid, and was underpinned by one fear; that by trying to adapt the grid too much, it may appear either too radical or too utopian within the French cultural context, and it was felt that this could well discredit it within the context and society in which it was trying to work. Hence discussion of other important issues took place. One such issue was ensuring means that each assessment would be as objective as possible as assessments would be carried out by different assessors who may carry different criteria. Another was developing sensitive approaches to delicate and intrusive subjects upon which individuals would be assessed, for example asking people about what social relations and networks people have, and assessing people’s emotional maturity. Thus, there was some realisation that the transnational partners should assist and offer their expertise with the grid within the cultural context which Languedoc were working, having already articulated the fundamental differences that existed between the two approaches.

The content and nature of the transnational meeting had two significant effects on the Coventry and Birmingham partners. Primarily, for both projects, there was a sense of increased confidence and reaffirmation in the approaches and philosophy that they were adopting. The second effect of the meetings was that the Coventry group felt it was essential for them to withdraw from one of their obligations of the transnational partnership, which was to pilot the assessment grid on their students. The project staff felt that the piloting of the grid was unviable and irresponsible for two reasons. First the questions of the grid may be potentially damaging to the subjects; and second, the implicit nature and essence of the grid would contravene what the students had been taught in terms of disability lying in the environment and not in the individual.

The findings of this evaluation are important as they carry a variety of ramifications in different spheres, which I will now discuss.

During my evaluation it became clear how even slight cultural differences can turn educational approaches on their head. Whilst this issue is arguably more a socio-political issue than an educational one, as national governments continue to cede influence on many areas of policy, it is these cultural differences which will become more and more significant. McLean (1992) points out that in the past there has been a “poverty of crude comparisons”[5] in the arena of international comparative education. What is needed is a wealth of cultural understanding between nations, and this can only occur through increased dialogue between organisations at grass roots level as well as higher levels of government. In the transnational partnersip I evaluated, greater understanding increased co-operation occurred only after considerable dialogue and discussion of different cultures and approaches. At that point it was recognised that it was not a black and white case of who is right and who is wrong. It was actually a case of we are here, and they are over there – how can we communicate to explain our position, and further understand the cultural reasons for their position.