SOCIETAL RESPONSES TO LONG-TERM DISABILITY

Whatever the fate of disabled people before the advent of capitalist society, with its coming they suffered economic and social exclusion. As a consequence of this exclusion, disability was produced in a particular form-as an individual problem requiring medical treatment. Old age suffered a similar fate. The transition to late capitalism ( or the "post-industrial society " as some writers have called it) has led to demands for the inclusion of those previously excluded. Consequently, the production of disability as an individual medical problem has increasingly come under attack and attempts to produce disability in a different, social form commensurate with inclusion, have been appearing upon the societal agenda. Before proceeding further, it is perhaps necessary to explain the terminology used in this chapter (see Appendix). Underpinning it is