A-Infos (en) France, UCL AL #349 - Anti-validism, One School Collective: Committing against school segregation (ca, de, fr, it, pt, tr)[machine translation]

For years, the government has made the notion of inclusiveness one of 
its major language elements when talking about schools and their 
consideration of disabilities. This did not happen without problems: on 
January 25, FO organized a strike to "say no to systematic and forced 
inclusion". Opposed to this position, but also critical of the 
government's speeches, the Collectif Une Unique École (CUSE) was created 
to provide another voice.
Fiona Campbell, specialist in Critical Disability Studies defines 
ableism as: "A network of beliefs, processes and practices that produces 
a particular type of self and body (the physical norm) that is projected 
as perfect, typical of species, and therefore essential and fully human. 
Disability is then thought of as an inferior state of humanity."

From defective body to defective society
From this definition, we understand the close link between ableism and 
the medical model of disability, which perceives the disabled body as a 
defective body and disability as a negative variation, a deviation from 
the biological norm which is the fact of 'individual. The difficulties 
of disabled people are therefore perceived as being directly linked to 
their physical, psychological, cognitive, sensory or intellectual 
difference. The logic of this model has led to the exclusion of disabled 
people from society and their institutionalization. We also clearly see 
the link that validism maintains with all other oppressions which have 
as a common basis a process of inferiorization of a human group. An 
inferiorization constructed from an ideal or a norm: white, man, cis, 
able-bodied...

There is always a problem with school, when we are interested in 
discrimination and relationships of domination: it thinks of itself as 
the place of republican universalism. Politicians, journalists and 
National Education workers talk about her this way. School could not be 
a place of discrimination to the extent that it would be a "sanctuary" 
where the republican principle of equality and tolerance is taught. 
Since the principle of equality is constantly invoked there, since it is 
written on the front walls of schools, then it would already be fully 
realized. This is obviously a fiction and relations of domination are at 
work at school as in the rest of society.

French schools are discriminatory. It is particularly able-bodied 
because French society is able-bodied[1]and the school is not located 
outside of society. It is designed based on the valid standard to which 
all students must comply, with meager compensation which often does not 
apply and through re-education largely outside of school. Bringing the 
"deviant" student as close as possible to the uncontested norm is the 
objective.

Students considered too "deviant", with disabilities that are too 
"heavy" (by which we mean too far from the valid norm) are excluded from 
school and sent to "specialized" structures. We see that it is the 
existence of a valid norm which constructs the "special" need. And when 
young people manage to be educated (often in specialized systems such as 
SEGPA or ULIS, sometimes outside systems), their path remains extremely 
compartmentalized: adults very quickly direct them towards some CAP or 
professional baccalaureate, barely talking to them about generally, if 
not to discourage them.

The inclusion of all students is a central issue in today's schools
The representations that workers have of what a student should be, what 
their work should be and what the needs of a disabled student are are 
erroneous and little questioned. The essentialization of disabled 
students by their disability constitutes one of the major problems. 
Validism, like all systems of domination, is diffuse, present everywhere 
and always.

We grew up in an ableist society, ableism has partly shaped us, all of 
us. It has shaped our imaginations and our representations; it has also 
shaped that of National Education workers who, in their vast majority, 
sincerely believe that if disabled students must be sidelined, it is for 
their own good, that they and they are a matter of care and not of 
school, that a student who cannot follow the program has no place in class.

Challenging academic standards

School is a place of great normativity. Its standards are those of 
academic success, productivity, decorum, for example. It requires 
students presenting a deviation from the norm in general - allophone 
students, students in great difficulty, trans, poor, etc. - and disabled 
students in particular to comply with these standards. The role of 
school is not to allow everyone to flourish from the singularities 
specific to each individual, nor to emancipate themselves. Students must 
be able to follow the programs, the rhythm, the group. Anyone who can't 
do it has no place there.

Finally, the French school is the school of a capitalist society. It is 
designed as a lever for economic competitiveness. The capitalist school 
values efficiency, performance, productivity and thereby excludes a 
significant number of its students, including disabled students. In the 
same way that once an adult he or she will have to adapt to the world of 
work, it is up to the student to conform to school. This is a condition 
for access to learning. A portion of students are still excluded from 
ordinary school to be placed in institutions (Therapeutic, Educational 
and Pedagogical Institute - ITEP, Medical-Educational Institutes - IME, 
etc.) which are defined by the UN as places of segregation.

Between assertive validism and timid anti-validism
We recently witnessed a call from the Force Ouvrière union against 
"systematic inclusion at school" which is a call for exclusion and 
segregation. Keeping a child out of school means keeping them out of 
society for life. But it is not only FO that has made active calls for 
maintaining segregation on the basis of disability. The CGT Social 
Action Federation recently issued a press release to oppose the granting 
of employee status to disabled ESAT workers[2]. These people come 
largely from EMIs and are children who have been excluded from regular 
school.

We must distinguish two union positions. On the one hand that of the 
corporatist unions which have abandoned the double task like FO and are 
not interested in the fight against discrimination. Like educational and 
ethical questions, they do not constitute the starting point for their 
reflections and orientations. As a result, they consider the presence of 
disabled students in ordinary schools as a deterioration of the working 
conditions of National Education workers.

On the other side we find the positions of the social transformation 
unions for whom the fight against discrimination is indeed a trade union 
fight. It is then appropriate to question the reasons why these unions 
are not fully committed to the anti-validist struggle. Within SUD 
Éducation or the CGT Educ'action (a certain number of activists of which 
are also involved within the CUSE), the movement is launched but still 
faces the difficulty of moving from a model medical to a social model of 
disability.

Likewise, no political party in France has clearly spoken out in favor 
of deinstitutionalization, the sine qua non condition of an inclusive 
school. There have been facade declarations on the left but no party has 
initiated a reflection on planning the deinstitutionalization process. 
There are also anti-validist activists within left-wing parties but they 
are very isolated.

Unions and political parties believe that we must choose between 
disabled people and people working in institutions. They believe that 
choosing to defend deinstitutionalization would amount to betraying the 
people who work in institutions. However, at CUSE, we want their 
integration into the public education service, in a logic of collective 
work serving the greatest number of students. There is no "competition" 
between workers' rights and the rights of disabled people.

The most radical left-wing organizations denounce and want the closure 
of everything that represents confinement and deprivation of freedoms, 
from CRAs to prisons: logic would dictate that they also oppose 
specialized institutions.

Antivalidism, a tool for emancipation
The anti-validist struggle is particularly little developed and visible 
in France, even though it has profound radicalism. Disability questions 
the injunction to social Darwinism, performance and productivity in 
neoliberal capitalism. Employees must be as efficient as possible in a 
competitive system where only the fittest deserve a job. Validism is a 
system of social selection which distinguishes between "valids" and 
"invalids".

The capitalist system is structurally validist because it is a 
productivist system: the so-called "valid" person is first and foremost 
the one who can produce and serve the national economy. The "disabled" 
person is assigned to unproductivity, and therefore to uselessness. But 
no one is unemployable either, if the salary conditions are reduced: in 
ESAT there is no salary but compensation calculated based on the 
allowances already received. The disabled worker becomes profitable and 
can be worn out at work, without the few protective rights granted to 
able-bodied workers.

Institutions against non-validist schools
There cannot be a non-validist school as long as there is somewhere else 
to send back those whom the school considers undesirable. As long as 
different, specialized structures exist, children will be moved, 
excluded and locked up there. Also, these institutions legitimize 
exclusion and disempower teams in their duty to welcome all young 
people: why make classroom learning accessible if structures are there 
to welcome children who are deemed unsuitable for it? school?

The CUSE, a collective of struggles
The Une Seule École Collective brings together disabled activists, 
parents experts in inclusion issues, discriminated and institutionalized 
former students, medico-social and health professionals. National 
Education[3]. We are all convinced that schools must welcome all 
children unconditionally and into ordinary classes.

We believe that the advent of a school for all will necessarily require 
a change in medical, educational and pedagogical practices and in the 
places where they are carried out. We believe that human, material and 
financial resources must be mobilized but that they must be accompanied 
by political consideration of the issue of disability which involves 
deinstitutionalization.

Political and activist trade union organizations must take a position on 
the question of the education of all children in the ordinary school 
setting. We want to support organizations that want to take this issue 
into account, participate in training, and build tools and resources. 
But we also want to show the serious consequences that vague political 
positions can have on the lives of disabled children sent to segregated 
institutions.

Elena Chamorro, Odile Maurin, Thomas Lecherbault, Jacqueline Triguel, 
Renaud Guy (members of CUSE)

To validate
[1]"People with disabilities are more often victims of physical, sexual 
and verbal violence", July 22, 2020, DREES.

[2]Establishment and Service for Assistance through Work, structure 
employing disabled workers. If since January 1, 2024, they have finally 
benefited from the right to strike and the right to organize, ESAT 
workers still do not have the status of employees, and are therefore not 
covered by the labor code and can be paid below the minimum wage.

[3]Find the text "Tribune of the Collectif Une Seule École" noting the 
creation of the collective, on Infolibertaire.net.

https://www.unioncommunistelibertaire.org/?Collectif-Une-Seule-Ecole-S-engager-contre-la-segregation-scolaire
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