Social Work Practitioner Research into Participation of People with Learning Disabilities in Elections in the UK—A Local Case Study

Abstract

There has been renewed interest across social work in professional discourse into the conceptualisation of social work as an activist profession with upholding human rights as a centrally organising principle. Implementing social work practice which upholds human rights is not, however, without difficulties. The contextual and abstract nature of the expression of human rights poses challenges to conceptual and measurement work. Practitioner researchers have a key role here, translating abstract concepts into rights-related personal outcomes and ultimately into evidence and knowledge informed practice. This article presents a case study of a local activist research project, Promote the Vote. The international literature indicates discrimination through denial of the rights of people with learning disabilities regarding political participation. In writing our learning from this case study, the authors have set out to consider the following: how can social workers engage in practice based research?; does an activist project such as Promote the Vote act as a mechanism through which social workers can evidence allyship with disabled people’s self-determined right to political participation? and how does a project which applies research methods support generation of practitioner-research evidence, which in turn contributes towards knowledge informed practice?