Leva som andra genom ställföreträdare : en rättslig och faktisk paradox

• In the past, people with intellectual disabilities have been treated as objects, rather than subjects, of law. Today, Swedish law purports to recognize that such persons have the same rights and freedoms as anyone else. To achieve this goal, Sweden’s social welfare law provides persons with intellectual disabilities a right to the support and service they need to “be able to live like others do”. For persons who lack the capability to apply for these measures because they lack the capabilities or do not meet the prerequisites to be a legal actor, a legal representative is needed.This dissertation examines the problem reflected in the constructed expression “ability to live like others do through legal representation”, first through traditional legal analysis of its implementation in Swedish law, followed by a critical theoretical analysis of that law.  The dissertation shows how Swedish law does not resolve the conflict between legal capacity and actual capabilities for people with intellectual disabilities, as it ratifies dependence on others for access to social welfare rights for people with intellectual disabilities in order for them to be taken seriously as legal actors and subjects before the law. The dissertation proposes a rethinking of the law from a Crip Theory perspective, which questions the able-mindedness norm of the legal subject. The dissertation argues that Swedish law exemplifies this norm as a reflection of power that produces and reproduces a certain kind of legal subject through normalization mechanisms. This dissertation shows that barriers still remain to the realization of full legal capacity for persons with intellectual disabilities, and to the possibilities for such persons to be recognized as self-determinate subjects in law. 

Ämnesord

SAMHÄLLSVETENSKAP  -- Juridik (hsv//swe)

SOCIAL SCIENCES  -- Law (hsv//eng)

Nyckelord

public law

legal representation

god man

förvaltare

legal subject

legal subjectivity

legal capacity

legal capability

persons with intellectual disabilities as legal subjects

social welfare-rights

law as power

normalization

Crip Theory.

Public Law

Offentlig rätt

Publikations- och innehållstyp

vet (ämneskategori)

dok (ämneskategori)