408 chapter 45
Who gets things started?
Within a community or neighborhood there will often be persons eager to become
involved in starting rehabilitation activities or even a program. All it may take is
something to ‘spark the idea’. This spark can be in the form of a person, a pamphlet,
or even a radio program that triggers people’s imaginations with ideas or basic
information.
For example, we know of one village medic, herself disabled by polio, who received
a WHO magazine with an article on “Rehabilitation for All.” As a result, she began to
organize the villagers to build a simple rehabilitation playground. In a similar fashion.
CHILD-to-child activity sheets have sometimes inspired teachers to conduct activities
that help school children to prevent certain disabilities or to behave toward disabled
children in a more friendly, welcoming way.
Often, to get things started, it takes a person with some background in rehabilitation
and in community work, to stay for a while in a village or neighborhood. Her role is to
bring together people with similar needs, helping them to form a plan of action and to
obtain the information and special resources they need.
Such a ‘resource person’ is sometimes called an ‘agent of change’. She need not
be a highly-trained professional in rehabilitation or social work. In fact, persons who
have professional degrees often have the hardest time accepting that parents and
disabled persons can and should be the primary workers and decision makers in a
community rehabilitation program.
What is necessary is that the agent of change be someone who respects ordinary
people, and is committed to helping them join together to meet their needs and
defend their rights.
The agent of change should be a counselor, not a boss; a provider of information
and choices, not orders or decisions. Especially when such a person comes from
outside the community, her role is to stay in the background, to help the people make
their own decisions and run their own program. At all costs she avoids taking charge.
Staying in the background, however, is easier said than done, especially for an
agent of change who is deeply committed. To make sure that a program is run by the
people, not by outsiders, it is often a good idea that agents of change and any visiting
professionals not be present all the time. Instead, they should encourage the program
to continue without them. Perhaps the final test of an agent of change’s success is to
leave the community forever, without her absence being much noticed. These ideas are
said beautifully in this old Chinese verse:
Disabled village Children