Crippled Justice, the
first comprehensive intellectual
history of disability policy
in the workplace from World War
II to the present, explains why
American employers and judges,
despite the Americans with Disabilities
Act, have been so resistant to
accommodating the disabled in
the workplace. Ruth O'Brien traces
the origins of this resistance
to the postwar disability policies
inspired by physicians and psychoanalysts
that were based on the notion
that disabled people should accommodate
society rather than having society
accommodate them. O'Brien shows
how the remnants of postwar cultural
values bogged down the rights-oriented
policy in the 1970s and how they
continue to permeate judicial
interpretations of provisions
under the Americans with Disabilities
Act. In effect, O'Brien argues,
these decisions have created
a lose/lose situation for the
very people the act was meant
to protect. Covering developments
up to the present, Crippled
Justice is an eye-opening
story of government officials
and influential experts, and
how our legislative and judicial
institutions have responded to
them.
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