1.2 International development of inclusion
Back to: Developing inclusive education and practice in Ukraine
In the last 30 years there have been numerous international conventions, declarations and statements. Papers were published from a social justice perspective that recommended a move away from integration to the inclusion of children. There has also been a move from focusing on Special Educational Needs and disability to including all children in inclusion (Rustemier, 2002).
Timeline
1981
UNESCO Sundberg Declaration
1989
Inclusion Charter (CSIE)
United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC)
1990
UNESCO World Declaration on Education for All
1993
United Nations Standard Rules on the Equalisation of Opportunities for Persons with Disabilities
1994
Salamanca Statement: Framework for action for SEN
2000
UNESCO World Education Forum on Education for All
2006
United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities
The UNESCO 1981 Sundberg declaration was a watershed moment where international disability groups and others from 103 countries met in Spain and created 16 articles as a plan of action that detailed the rights disabled people had to education and that a global Education For All (EFA) policy would be globally beneficial (Peters, 2007).
The Inclusion Charter (CSIE, 1989) looked at inclusive practice for the first time as a ‘human rights platform’. In doing so “the cornerstone of human rights is that human dignity resides in every person, simply by virtue of being human and this dignity should be recognised and respected by all” (Rustemier, 2002, p.8).
The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child (UNCRC, 1989) advocated the right to education and provided four principles. (1) the need for non-discriminatory action respecting equality of opportunity. (2) the need to ensure the best interests of the child. (3) the need to consider child development broadly. (4) the need to respect the child’s voice in decision-making.
The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) World Declaration on Education for All in 1990 had representatives from 155 countries and NGOs in Thailand (Mittler, 2005). During this conference a world declaration of Education For all was developed and supported by a Framework of Action (Hodkinson and Williams-Brown, 2023).
The United Nations Standard Rules on the Equalization of Opportunities for Persons with Disabilities (1993) determined that children with Special Educational Needs should be considered in all planning and curricular activities, with an assurance that appropriate additional support is available (Rustemier, 2002).
The Salamanca Statement: Framework for Action for Special Educational Needs (SEN) (UNESCO, 1994) highlighted the need for inclusion and envisaged a system in which the norm would be for all children to be educated in mainstream schools regardless of each child’s need (Nutbrown and Clough, 2006).
The UNESCO World Education Forum on Education for All in 2000 was organised to ascertain progress of the EFA agenda. More than 1,100 people from 164 countries were involved in reviewing and setting targets to be achieved by 2015 (Peters, 2007).
The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities in 2006 reviewed member state policies on people with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities. It aimed to encourage the enactments of laws and policies that ensured the inclusion of disabled people and aimed to raise the aspirations and achievements of children with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities.
Activity
- Read further into international publications on inclusion.
- Consider this information on the international drive for inclusion in relation to practice in Ukraine. How influential do you think this is to the development of inclusion in Ukraine?
- Have you heard of models of disability? Please read into what this means and then continue onto the next page.
Additional reading
Ainscow, M., (2020). Promoting inclusion and equity in education: lessons from international experiences. Nordic Journal of Studies in Educational Policy, 6(1), pp.7-16.
Barnes, C., (2019). Understanding the social model of disability: Past, present and future. In Routledge handbook of disability studies (pp. 14-31). Routledge.
Goldiner, A., (2022). Understanding “disability” as a cluster of disability models. The Journal of Philosophy of Disability, 2, pp.28-54.