Different roads to the same target: inclusion through exclusion?

Two studies were undertaken in former Soviet republics: Ukraine and Moldova. The first study in 2012-2015 was investigating how families with impaired children experience their lives in societies with transition economies, meeting conditions of poverty. As a result of this study, crucial factors, constituting poverty in these families were analysed and identified as a multi-dimensional issue ‘for understanding the holistic picture of disaster and hardship leading families with ChildrenwithDisabilities (ChDis) to poverty'(4). The research study has shown that special education as an area of social exclusion and segregation of ChDis and their families, rooted in the principle of socialist humanism and ‘DefectologicalEducationalModel (DEM)' (2), played a significant role in the reproduction of poverty in these families. Historical dominance of social exclusion through DEM segregation for disabled learners in the Soviet ideological context, currently is recognised as ‘unrealized utopia' (2). Inclusive movement is met as a meaningful challenge in education, generating resistance from families. The second study started in 2019, investigating inclusion in the same countries, adding Sweden as EU country (1, 3). All the data will be analysed corresponding to contextual circumstances, contributing to further illumination of the research question - if social inclusion in life could be reached through segregation in school? References: Berhanu G. (2014). Special education today in Sweden. Special Education International Perspectives: Practice Across the Glob. Advances in Special Education.V.28:209-241. Kalinnikova L., Trygged S. (2014). Retrospect on Care and Denial of Children with Disabilities in Russia. Scandinavian journal on disability research. V.16(3):229-248. Rosenqvist, J. (1986). Psychisch geschädigte Personen und ihre Arbeitsmöglichkeiten in der DDR, in der Bundesrepublik und in Schweden. Eine komparative Studie. Didakometrie und Soziometrie (Malmö, Schweden: Lehrerhochschule), Nr29. Kalinnikova Magnusson, L. (2016). Scientific Report Project title: «Human resources in poverty and disability: family perspective (Moldova and Ukraine)»: Popular description of the project. http://hig.diva-portal.org/smash/record.jsf?pid=diva2%3A931679&dswid=7622Research grant from the Department of Education, Faculty of Education and Business studies: 8421-77138-181-8