Milan Šveřepa marks 10 years at Inclusion Europe. This is his post number 3.
If there’s one thing I’ve learned in my time at Inclusion Europe, it’s how often policy-makers, service providers and other organisations misunderstand what “rights-based” policies and services mean. And what inclusion means.
- It’s not about committing the right words to paper. It’s about committing yourself to the right actions.
- It’s not about an easy fix or a straight line of progress. It’s about a series of values-based actions that, over time, tip the scales.
- It’s not about buildings and “centres”. It’s about what happens inside and outside these places.
In other words, it’s about culture.
Not culture as in music or books. Culture as the values you hold dear, and the behaviours by which you live them. Culture as the actions you reward and the attitudes you cultivate.
It’s not about words on paper
How many strategies have you seen from governments, regions, service providers and all kinds of organisations? And how many achieved anything other than taking up space on a shelf or a server?
Most of these strategies don’t fail because they have the wrong targets. They fail because targets are all they have.
For a strategy to succeed, you need targets. But more importantly, you need to design for the values and behaviours that will help you reach them.
And you need to show these values and behaviours in everyday decisions and actions. Yours, and everyone else’s. It’s about what you do, and how you react to what others do.
It’s not about an easy fix
As much as we might want one, there is no magic technical solution that will fix everything once and for all.
It’s a series of actions and iterations. Some feel small, some bigger. Some are technical and easy to describe and put in place. Others are less clear, and need constant guidance and interpretation.
But all of them are guided by the same values. And all of them contribute to the same goal.
Some of these things are hard to do. Some were well meant but turned out to be counterproductive. There will be setbacks.
It’s about being honest, and taking enough actions that the right ones outweigh the mistakes.
It’s not about buildings and “centres”
Of course, all of this happens in places. But not in places created specifically for inclusion. Inclusion happens everywhere: in families, schools, services, public administration, workplaces.
Which means: to build inclusion, centre the people.
Not only people with intellectual disabilities, but the people around them too.
Centre the people and build them up. Help them have ambitions for themselves and for those around them. Help them understand what rights mean, and how to respect them, in themselves and in others. Help them feel they belong.
A culture worth living
To put rights-based policies and services into practice, to create inclusion, is to help yourself and everyone around you see that “rights-based” isn’t just words on paper.
That inclusion is a culture, grown by living its values.
That inclusion is a culture that allows people to see their worth.
That inclusion is a culture worth living.
Milan Šveřepa, Chief Executive, Inclusion Europe
Milan marks 10 years at Inclusion Europe:
