Beyond normalisation and impairment: Theorising subjectivity for learning difficulties theory and practice

Normalisation and social role valorisation continue to play a central role in shaping debates and practice relating to learning difficulties. In the context of recent arguments, this paper draws on the work of Foucault to deconstruct these theories. Foucault’s work alerts us to a conceptual confusion at their heart which reproduces a common but problematic individual-society dualism. There is an implicit, and problematic, presence in the theories of a pre-social individual conceived as having essential impairments, and who is passive in the face of negative socialisation. We propose that Foucault’s “ethical” domain of inquiry, with its concern for how people actively understand themselves and govern their conduct in relation to specific values and a “truth” that they are obliged to recognise in themselves, provides the basis for returning the individual-as-subject to theories in an active, critical manner.