Invalidske organizacije i društvo - problemi samorazumevanja
Disabled people's organizations and society - the problems of self-understanding

Summary/Abstract: In the first part of text the author critically examines the officially accepted term persons with disabilities suggesting that it is not compatible with Serbian languages spirit. He points to the negative effects of too often repeated terminological revolutions: He concludes that there is need for a more cautious stance in accepting linguistically-based solutions for meta-language problems. The adequate conceptualization of disabled people's organizations goes far beyond the terminological level. The author has identified two possible meanings of the term: 1) organizations dealing with issues related to disability, particularly with promoting the entire social status of persons with disabilities; 2) Organizations whose members are exclusively disabled persons themselves or their legal representatives. The author has pointed that there is no correspondence between the two senses: there are organizations with no disabled members that successfully contribute in making the disability issues an integral and inevitable part of policy and public opinion-makers' agenda. The disabled people's organizations have no monopoly over disability issues. On the other hand, the organizations whose members are exclusively disabled persons need not to be confined in their activities within a disability horizon. The third part concerns with relationship between disabled people's organizations and entire NGO-sector.

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