&ldquo / New paradigm of disability&rdquo / relates not only to persons but also to the
environment they are living in. Therefore recent studies concentrate on the
dynamic interplay of the persons and the environment, rather than rather than
studying them as separate entities. This approach has revealed that disabled
people become handicapped when they face with barriers restricting or impeding
their activities in daily life.
Physical, cultural and social barriers have been undertaken by many
countries after substantial debate. In the United Kingdom and Japan for instance,
disability and accessibility issues have been tackled with reference to disabled
people&rsquo / s demands and long-tem struggles against discriminatory implementations
in the past. In these countries, whilst disability issue has been discussed,
accessibility legislation including numerous measurements for implementation has
been enacted and a considerable progress for removing barriers and providing
accessibility in the built environment has been experienced through many
institutional instruments.
In Turkey, although there are now a lot of legislative measurements for
accessibility, little progress is observed in recent years. Barriers in the built
environment are still restricting, and even hindering full participation of disabled
v
people to social life. The problem of inaccessibility is seen related to practice
rather than legislation or theoretical frameworks in Turkey. Since they are a part of
the bureaucratic system having responsibility on the planning and designing of
built environment, local agencies with their administrative and technical staff and
organisation gain importance in terms of maintaining accessibility to the disabled.
The study aims to provide information about attitudes of local agencies towards
disability and accessibility in terms of practitioners rather than users. This study
interrogates the knowledge level and outlooks of the related personnel and works
of local agencies about disability and accessibility.
Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:METU/oai:etd.lib.metu.edu.tr:http://etd.lib.metu.edu.tr/upload/12609814/index.pdf |
Date | 01 August 2008 |
Creators | Caglayan Gumus, Deniz |
Contributors | Gunay, Baykan |
Publisher | METU |
Source Sets | Middle East Technical Univ. |
Language | English |
Detected Language | English |
Type | Ph.D. Thesis |
Format | text/pdf |
Rights | To liberate the content for public access |
Page generated in 0.0035 seconds