(Digital) Welfare for All? Disabled People and their Relatives as Participants and Non-Users in Denmark’s Digital State

• In Event: Digital Inclusion In Practices - I: Digital inclusion in public action

Abstract

Statistics seem to confirm that Denmark's digital welfare is a success because most citizens use public digital self-services. Yet, a new disability rights movement called #enmillionstemmer (#onemillionvotes) seems to disrupt such reality. Despite inclusion initiatives performed by the Agency for Digitization, disabled people and their relatives' rights do not seem to be sufficiently covered. The movement, initiated in 2019, indicates that welfare provision for disabled people and their relatives is insufficient and oppressive. In recent years, scholars have unfolded patterns of exclusion in the mandatory digitalization of welfare services. The participation of disabled people and their relatives in protecting their rights in recent digital reforms of the public sector is widely under-examined. This paper takes on an ethnographic approach and draws from Adele Clarke’s situational analysis to explore a mix of archival materials and interviews that compare #onemillionvotes' motivations, and inclusion initiatives performed by the Agency for Digitization. The paper questions whether the public sector's mandatory digitalization excludes disabled people and their relatives in participating in what constitutes equal and sufficient (digital) welfare. Building on literature from disability studies, participatory design, and feminist STS, the paper critically maps out user research and the agency's participatory methods. The paper problematizes user research and inclusion strategies that understand disabled people as non-digital citizens. Finally, the paper speculates on participatory methods, where disabled people and their relatives lead and participate in how they are supported as users of public services, that are not always digital.

Author

• Barbara Nino Carreras, IT University of Copenhagen