Encouraging real or make-believe citizen-workers? Narratives of self-realization versus disabling support-to-work contexts by individuals with High Functioning Autism

The objective of this paper is to analyse how narratives targeting ambitions and self-realisation in work life are expressed by individuals with HFA in relation to the citizen-worker discourse. This ethnographic study comprises 26 qualitative interview narratives by 11 participants with HFA. Findings indicate that the participants have developed a strong citizen-worker identity. The will is an essential point of gravity, expressed through notions of individual meaningfulness and ambitions of being perceived as resources in any vocational context. Barriers to these ambitions are experienced as personally counteractive support-to-work practices. These results suggest that disability legislation and policies are caught in a mantra of stagnating normalisation, resulting in disability-worker interventions that are incompatible with meanings emphasized in the citizen-worker discourse, which is the new ‘normal’ of today.RésuméÀ l’instar d’autres pays occidentaux, la Suède a une législation sur le handicap qui coexiste avec les politiques d’activation sur le marché du travail. Le discours de ces dernières met l’accent sur le « citoyen-travailleur », compétent et productif, dont on attend qu’il réussisse en réalisant ses ambitions et des objectifs qui leurs soient personnels et auxquels ils attachent du sens. Ce discours touche aussi les groupes de personnes handicapées qui bénéficient d’aide à l’emploi, par exemple les personnes atteintes d’autis...

Source: ALTER - European Journal of Disability Research - March 21, 2019 Category: Disability Source Type: research