The (non)accessibility of West German cities. Municipal 'disability plans' of the 1970s and 1980s at the intersection of the criticism from those affected, expert discourses, and the logic of municipal decision-making processes

• Applicant: Professorin Dr. Gabriele Lingelbach
• Subject Area: Modern and Contemporary History
• Term: since 2025
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 573551080

In the late 1970s and early 1980s, many West German cities drew up so-called disability plans, which included the goal of reducing built barriers in public and private spaces. The plans were intended to enable social rehabilitation and a higher degree of social participation and self-determination for people with disabilities. By analyzing these 'disability plans', the project pursues five lines of inquiry: First, from a perspective of everyday history, it examines how the built environment was designed from the point of view of those affected, which barriers influenced their everyday realities and routines, and which barriers limited their social contacts and opportunities for cultural participation. Particular attention is paid to the question of the extent to which a distinction should be made between different groups of disabled people, for example, whether people with walking disabilities faced different problems than people with visual impairments. Secondly, the focus is on self-advocacy by those affected: the study examines how they raised the issue of accessibility in public and how they brought their interests and perspectives to bear in the development of the 'disability plans'. Thirdly, the contribution of experts (for example urban planners) will be analyzed in terms of when they focused on which barriers (and thus which group of affected persons) and what solutions they developed - in other words, problematization trends with regard to disability will be presented. Fourth, the focus is on municipal responses to growing criticism of built barriers and, in particular, the change in the objectives pursued by municipal decision-makers with the 'disability plans'. Fifth, micro-historical case studies will be used to analyze interaction scenarios between the aforementioned groups of actors, as well as the question of why many projects failed. With the help of these five perspectives, the central question in dis/ability history about the social construction of disability is posed by focusing on the role of the built environment in this very construction. At the same time, the project takes into account the demand of dis/ability history to examine people with disabilities not only as objects of the actions of non-disabled people, but as subjects of their own history, since disabled persons were intensively involved in the discourse on accessibility. Furthermore, by distinguishing between different groups of people with disabilities, the project can contribute to a more differentiated view of the history of different affected groups. Last but not least, the project highlights a category of inequality that has been largely ignored by previous research on the history of urban social inequalities.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants