Disabled people in rural Kenya: can the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities make a difference?

The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) is the fruition of a protracted struggle by disability activists to wake the international community from its comatose on the issue of disability, presenting a real opportunity to address the needs of the world’s largest minority. Whilst the recognition of disability rights completes the paradigmatic conceptual shift from medical to social disability model, the realisation of these rights is reliant upon multitudinous factors. This dissertation focusses on some of the underlying causes and barriers pertaining to disability and how those factors impact upon the ability of disabled people, particularly in the global South, to claim their rights, and governments to provide them. The paper builds upon previous literature and research to examine the conditions surrounding Kenya’s promulgation of the CRPD and the ability of rights holders, the majority of who live rurally, to realise the rights bestowed upon them by government ratification of the CRPD. The study is predicated on empirical research in a rural community and a comparison of collected primary data with a 2007 study by the African Union of the Blind. The lived experience of rural disabled communities is also observed through the lens of photo elicitation interviews. The findings show that disability is a social experience influenced by intersectional disadvantages where impairment has some underlying reality. Simple awareness raising measures and improved data collection with nuanced analysis can benefit the implementation of the CRPD and improve the lived experience of rural disabled communities