Enabling the Voter Participation of Canadians with Disabilities: Reforming Canada’s Electoral Systems

Abstract

In this article, practices of Canadian electoral management bodies at federal provincial and territorial levels are examined, especially those methods designed to assist electors with disabilities with voting. Different models of disability co-exist within and around electoral rules, procedures, practices and overall systems. Electoral arrangements in Canada incorporate three distinct models of disability: an individualistic-biomedical approach to disability, a functional model of disability, and a social model of disability. These models have distinctive implications for addressing barriers and making access and inclusion real for voters with disabilities. Electoral reforms address different broad categories of impairments: electors with permanent disabilities, serious illness or infirmity; electors with physical mobility issues; electors with hearing challenges; electors with visual impairments; and, electors with any significant disability, whether chronic or episodic in nature, visible or invisible in appearance. Changes to election processes are shifting the mix of disability models embedded in electoral systems, away from individual and medical conceptions and toward functional and contextual notions of disability.