On the social participation of the person with intellectual disability1

Abstract

The current legislation in Brazil recognizes people with disabilities as subjects of rights and establishes the reduction of barriers so that this population can exercise their citizenship, but there are still several obstacles that hinder this process. Documents such as the 1988 Brazilian Constitution, the 2007 International Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities and more recently, the Brazilian Law on Inclusion, from 2015, affirm the need to promote the social protagonism of people with disabilities. Among the forms of protagonism, the organizations of persons with disabilities play an important role in defending rights. In the case of intellectual disability, although there are organizations that advocate the rights of these people, the defenders are mostly family members, specialized professionals or in some cases politicians. In this context, this study proposes the investigation of the forms of social and school participation of people with intellectual disabilities. The methodology of the study included the analysis of public statistical data from the Brazilian Demographic Census (2010) and School Census (from 2014 to 2018), regarding school and labor market participation. The IBM SPSS Statistics program was used to process the data, which were analyzed in the light of specialized literature and current legislation. The study revealed that, in education, the majority of students with disabilities are students with intellectual disabilities. In relation to the labor market, among all disabilities, intellectual disability has lower participation rates. The conclusion points to the need to take into account this state of affairs in order to expand and formulate new policies of social participation.