Lack of data (as important as it is) isn’t the main problem. Lack of action is. I was invited to speak at European Parliament’s Employment Committee workshop on independent living (and deinstitutionalisation) in December 2025. Didn’t say anything new I’m afraid. ❗️800,000+ people with intellectual disabilities in institutions❗️Many adults living with their families and relying…
After European Commission and EEG meeting, December 2025, where I presented a proposal for active support to DI-practitioners at national level: The EU has a good tradition of supporting things that help with deinstitutionalisation. It needs to built on it. Before I came to Inclusion Europe my only Brussels-based previous was the EEG.“The European Expert…
Contribution at disability conference of Denmark presidency of the Council of the EU, Copenhagen, October 2025. “Being included is also a sense of belonging and having someone you can trust,” I said during my panel contribution. It was very nice to be quoted on this by minister Sophie Hæstorp Andersen in her closing speech. LinkedIn…
Lecture at West University of Timisoara for social work and psychology students, October 2025. How do you build inclusion? Through support to a person to have a place to live, things to do and people to see.In other words through social roles and relationships. But most people in institutions don’t have anything resembling a ‘normal’…
It started yesterday as a late night joke. It works in the morning (and always). Actually, it started about two years ago. While we were at a conference in Copenhagen, Theresa Shearer FRSE urged me to go see Kim Scott talk about her book and the practice of Radical Candor. One of many good recommendations…
Hey Milan didn’t you say there were *two* books you’d recommend on deinstitutionalisation… I did, din’t I. Same as the first one, the second book isn’t about deinstitutionalisation either. It was written by Prof. Bent Flyvbjerg and Dan Gardner, and is called How Big Things Get Done. The Surprising Factors Behind Every Successful Project, from…
Earlier this week I was in a workshop to learn, share, discuss disability rights and policies in the EU, with special attention to deinstitutionalisation. The message I brought was quite simple: Policies matter, and they have direct impact on people. It can take (scratch that – it takes) many years.It can be hard to see.(And…
Global Disability Summite, Berlin, April 2025 As organisations of people with intellectual disabilities, and other advocates, we spend a lot of time demanding deinstitutionalisation.We also need to give time to working with those who make it happen. It’s about demonstrating to those responsible that deinstitutionalisation is doable.It has been done.It is being done.It can and…
Hey Milan, would you recommend any books on deinstitutionalisation, I was asked recently. And sure enough, I shared some reading I find useful and interesting. But I didn’t mention the two books that I consider the most important, and use almost daily in my work. Neither of them is about deinstitutionalisation. But both are. Take…
To tell about different stories, experiences, and perspectives on the work we are doing on Inclusion Europe. That is, broadly ;-), the aim of a new podcast series we started in April 2022 at Inclusion Europe Radio. The conversations are hosted by Soufiane El Amrani and me (sometimes, I go it alone). Listen to the…
