Contextualising Human Rights: Residents’ Rights in Nursing Homes and Hostels
The issue of human rights has become increasingly prominent in social commentary in recent years. Through the media we constantly hear about some form of human rights abuse that is occurring somewhere in the world. However, violations of human rights occur every day in our own backyards. This paper looks at human rights in the context of residential aged care and presents findings from PhD research undertaken in Western Australian nursing homes and hostels.
The study investigated the ways in which human rights are constructed in residential aged care. Residents, their relatives, and staff members were interviewed about their perceptions, knowledge and experiences of residents’ rights and human rights in nursing homes and hostels. Analysis of interview data indicates that many participants had only a vague understanding of human rights, often explaining them as something that was important for “other people”, “somewhere else”, and not part of everyday life. It seems that many people perceive human rights as something outside themselves, and that the “ownership” of this concept does not belong to the layperson, but to academics and the legal fraternity.
The paper discusses human rights experiences in residential aged care and explores different ways of understanding human rights and the ways rights might be ‘contextualised’ in relation to specific disadvantaged groups. While it is important it is to ensure protection of the rights of vulnerable people, it is equally important to reject the implication that human rights only belong to the disadvantaged, as this may stigmatise and weaken community ownership of human rights.
At the core of human rights principles is a vision of a shared humanity, a view of society as a community that is inclusive and holistic. Human rights may provide a strong foundation for social work practice and be used to combat current ‘residualist’ approaches to welfare provision and the stigmatisation of marginalised groups in society. The paper argues that common perceptions of human rights as existing “out there” distances them from everyday experience and weakens the strength and utility of human rights as a protective mechanism for the most vulnerable in society.