Abstract: Employment of people with disabilities in Southwest China’s ethnic minority areas is characterized by relatively high pres-sure, a poor environment and single form. Supported employment can solve the problems faced by people with disabilities in the ethnic minority areas of Southwest China. Therefore, it is of practical signif-icance to promote such a new form of employment. But in promoting the development of supported employment, it is necessary to strength-en its local top-level design and to establish corresponding legal and policy systems so as to give full play to the positive role of the govern-ment and establish a strong support system.

 

Keywords: people with disabilities ? southwest ethnic minority areas ? supported employment

 

People with disabilities are called “the largest minority group in the world.”¹ With the promulgation of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities, the “integration” into society of people with disabilities has become the core issue related to disability. At present, the legal policy for people with disabilities has shifted focus from providing a basic life guarantee to promoting their participation in social life.² The employment of persons with disabilities is an important way to integrate them into society. Among various forms of employment, supported employment is a new mode of integrated employment that has been proved to be effective in promoting the employment of people with disabilities through domestic and overseas practices. Compared with other regions in China, the employment of people with disabilities is particularly important in southwest of the country where there are many ethnic groups³ affected by laggardly economic development, the size and structure of their disabled population, and other factors. Therefore, based on the analysis of the characteristics of supported employment, this paper explores the practical significance and feasible path of promoting supported employment of persons with disabilities in this area.

 

Due to their physical and psychological conditions, people with disabilities face discrimination from employers. And due to factors such as their demographic struc-ture and socio-economic development, the ethnic areas in Southwest China have more prominent features in this regard.

 

 

According to the statistics of the China Disabled Persons’ Federation, the total number of disabled people with disability certificates nationwide as of December 31, 2015 was 31,456,954. Among them, the number of disabled persons in Sichuan prov-ince was 2,421,903, and the number of persons with disabilities aged between 15 and 59, the employment age group, was 1,282,603, both of which ranked first in the coun-try. The number of persons with intellectual disabilities and persons with handicaps unemployed was 158,698 and 170,153 respectively, ranking 4th and 2nd nationwide.

 

The total number of persons with disabilities in both Yunnan province and Guizhou province, both Southwest provinces with many ethnic groups, is also larger than most other provinces and regions in the country.⁴ According to the statistics of the second national sample survey on disabled persons, the vast majority, 71.8 percent, of ethnic minority disabled persons is distributed in the western region; if divided by the eight economic zones, the number of minority disabled people in Southwest China is about 39.51 percent.⁵

 

In addition, in terms of the education level, something that has a significant impact on employment status, a survey conducted by China Disabled Persons Fed-eration in 2015 on the education level of persons with disabilities who have obtained disability certificates above the age of 15 shows that the number of illiterate persons with disabilities in Sichuan, Yunnan and Guizhou was 393,767, 319,986 and 306,636 respectively, ranking fourth, sixth and seventh nationwide.⁶ In the meantime, people of ethnic minorities with disabilities generally have a lower level of education than disable persons of Han nationality, and the proportion of illiterates is nearly 7 percent-age points higher than that of Han people with disabilities.⁷

 

The above shows that there is a large population base for poorly educated dis-abled people in the ethnic minority areas in Southwest China. Among them, the num-ber of persons with intellectual and mental disabilities who are more vulnerable to employment discrimination also accounts for a large proportion of the total number of people with disabilities of the same kind in the country. People with ethnic minorities face “double discrimination” from the labor market, and most of this group is largely distributed in southwest ethnic minority areas.

 

Both theoretical and practical researches have confirmed that there is a positive correlation between the education level and the employment rate of disabled persons,⁸ and that the education level of that group in ethnic minority areas in Southwest China is at a relatively low level across the country, thus increasing the difficulty of employ-ing disabled people. Therefore, in general, employment of persons with disabilities in this area is under greater pressure than in other regions.

 

 

The level of regional economic development is one of the important factors that affect the employment of disabled persons, second only to the social security status of disabled persons. At the same time, economic growth is the prerequisite and basis for the development of social security for persons with disabilities. ⁹ Factors such as the total output value and the industrial structure are closely related to the employment opportunities and employment levels of the disabled.

 

Most of the southwest minority areas are relatively backward and slow in eco-nomic development. Taking regional GDP as the indicator of the level of regional economic development as an example, in 2015, the GDP of the other four provinces, municipalities and autonomous regions in Southwest China, excluding Sichuan, was significantly lower than the national average.¹⁰ In addition, according to the propor-tion of tertiary industries in GDP, the composition ratios of the primary industries in Sichuan, Guizhou and Yunnan were respectively 12.2 percent, 15.6 percent, and 15.1 percent, while the proportion of primary industries in more than half of the rest of the country did not reach 10 percent.¹¹The above data show that, compared with other ar-eas nationwide, the relatively low economic level of ethnic minority areas means that there are fewer employment opportunities for disabled residents in Southwest China. At the same time, the proportion of the primary industry is also generally higher than it is in other regions. Therefore, the employment of disabled people is concentrated in agriculture, forestry, animal husbandry and fishery industries. In addition to individual employment, the employment system of disabled persons is mainly composed of con-centrated employment and proportional employment, both of which are protective em-ployment methods adopted by the government. Either the establishment of welfare en-terprises in accordance with the law for the placement of persons with disabilities, or the enactment of laws directly requiring employers to employ people with disabilities in accordance with the statutory rate, is a legal policy affecting the demand side of the labor market to achieve employment for the disabled. In other words, there is a lack of employment in the system of employment for persons with disabilities in the region that can increase their employability while facilitating the motivation of employers to hire persons with disabilities. In fact, relying solely on the forms of employment of persons with disabilities that affect the behavior of the demand side cannot achieve good results.

 

Taking urban disabled residents with relatively more job opportunities as an ex-ample, at the end of 2015, the number of persons with disabilities in urban areas in proportional employment accounted for 27.1 percent of the total number of disabled persons employed. Except for Yunnan and the Tibet autonomous region, the propor-tion of disabled persons with proportional employment in the southwestern minority areas is below this figure. Among them, Sichuan and Guizhou are only 17.9 percent and 17.3 percent respectively.¹²

 

 

As of the end of 2012, the minority population of the national autonomous areas in Sichuan accounted for 60.63 percent of the local total population, in Guizhou it accounted for 60.72 percent, in Yunnan 56.57 percent, in the Tibet autonomous region 91.94 percent and in Chongqing 71.05 percent of the local total population,¹³ all of which are typical ethnic areas that are home to a large proportion of the country’s eth-nic groups. Compared with other regions, the social and political development in the ethnic minority areas in Southwest China are affected by the peculiar factors of ethnic relations. Social harmony is essential for stability and development.¹⁴ The formation of harmonious ethnic relations depends to a large extent on the level of economic development and the material gains obtained by all ethnic groups through economic development. At the same time, harmonious ethnic relations will in turn promote eco-nomic development and social stability.

 

Providing jobs to people with disabilities is an important way to embody their personal values and enabling them to earn a decent living. In a general sense, employ-ment of disabled people, as a vulnerable group, concerns social stability and harmony. There are a large number of disabled people in the ethnic minority areas of Southwest China, highlighting the issue of disable people’s unemployment. On the one hand, the employment of persons with disabilities is an important way for them to integrate into society. Persons with disabilities who are unable to be employed will be segregated from mainstream society. The disabled population in Southwest China comprises Han people with disabilities and people with disabilities of a variety of other ethnic groups, of which the latter constitute the greater proportion. Therefore, the employment status of persons with disabilities will affect ethnic integration and social harmony in the re-gion. The poor employment situation disabled persons face results in the reduction of their material benefits, the gradual degradation of their physiological functions, their poor quality of life, and dissatisfaction with society, which is then further manifested in the emergence of ethnic conflicts and disharmony among people from different ethnic groups. Accordingly, the employment of persons with disabilities in Southwest China will further exert a special influence on ethnic relations in the region in addition to their universal social impact.

 

 

As a model of the integrated employment of disabled persons, supported employ-ment has been proved to be suitable for all types of disabled people both at home and abroad, benefiting the physical and mental development of persons with disabilities, effectively promoting the employment of persons with disabilities, and representing the employment trends for them. In recent years, the ethnic minority areas in South-west China have tried supported employment activities both in terms of system and practice. In 2014, the statistical bulletin on local disabled people showed that a total of 213 disabled persons were employed through supported employment in Sichuan province and Chongqing municipality.¹⁵ In the meantime, local regulatory documents including specific measures for supported employment development were released in the past two years in Sichuan, Guizhou, Yunnan and Chongqing.¹⁶ On this basis, promoting supported employment has practical significance in the minority areas in Southwest China.

 

 

Initially, supported employment was created mainly for people with intellectual disabilities, providing personalized support according to their individual character-istics and needs,¹⁷ so that persons with intellectual disabilities could find jobs in the normal and competitive workplace and receive the same treatment as non-disabled people. Supported employment, first practiced in the United States in the 1970s, was enacted in Developmental Disability Assistance and Bill of Rights Act of 1984, which clearly defines supported employment.¹⁸ The Rehabilitation Act of 1986 redefined the concept of supported employment.¹⁹ Since then, supported employment in the United States has been rapidly developed and extended to other countries and regions.

 

In 1993, the European Union of Supported Employment (EUSE) was founded to promote supported employment.²⁰ By the beginning of this century, nearly 30 coun-tries in the European Union and the European Free Trade Area had launched related practices, one-third of which treat supported employment as a national mainstream project. Some countries, such as Norway, and Spain, formed a legal framework for supported employment.²¹In some countries and regions in Asia, such as Japan, Malay-sia and Taiwan, supported employment has also been introduced. Supported employ-ment, while expanding in many countries and regions in the world, is very much in line with the rights and the spirit of integration advocated by the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities adopted in 2006. It has become a major form of employment for disabled persons advocated by international organizations such as the International Labor Organization and Handicap International.

 

The Chinese mainland started supported employment practices early this century. By 2014, China had introduced pilot projects in Beijing, the Guangxi Zhuang auton-omous region, Guangdong province, Hunan province, Jilin province, Liaoning prov-ince and Shandong province. Since 2006, supported employment has been explicitly proposed in central government policy documents such as the “Policy for the Imple-mentation of the 11th Five-Year Plan for Rehabilitation of Intellectual Disabilities” and “Opinion of China Disabled Persons’ Federation on Further Improving the Work of Intellectual Disabled Persons.” The “Basic Norms for Disabled Nursing Services” (Trial Implementation) promulgated in 2013 defined supported employment. During the period between the two sessions in 2016, the Chinese People’s Political Consul-tative Conference National Committee members from Macao submitted a proposal entitled Carrying out Supported Employment to Help People with Intellectual Dis-abilities out of Poverty, in which they recommended supported employment should be supported at the policy level. In addition, in August 2016, the State Council issued the Outline for Accelerating the Well-off of Disabled Persons in the 13th Five-Year Plan in which it proposed training a team of employment counselors, and listed supported employment as a priority item for increasing the income of disabled persons. Under the guidance of the central government, Beijing, Guangdong, Hunan and Shandong also successively issued related local policies. From this point of view, supported employment is becoming an integral part of the employment system for people with disabilities in China at the level of practice and legal policy. It is foreseeable that it will be promoted as the main form of employment for persons with disabilities in the future. Therefore, the implementation of supported employment in southwest ethnic minority areas is in line with the development trend of employment for persons with disabilities.

 

 

The main targets of supported employment are those with intellectual disabilities. Traditionally, this group lacks the ability to work and cannot complete complicated tasks. Thus, those without long-term family care or placement in isolated workplac-es cannot be accepted by the mainstream society and the labor market. Supported employment has brought this disadvantaged population out of family care with the assistance of state remedies while including them on the employment ladder. It has also been proved that this policy is also suitable for other types of people with disabil-ities who have employment needs. For example, in the European Union, the target of supported employment is not limited to people with intellectual disabilities: countries such as Austria and Belgium extend their supported employment target to people with all types of disabilities.²² At present, there are a large number of disabled people in the ethnic minority areas in Southwest China, those with intellectual disabilities account-ing for a large proportion of them. The existing forms of employment of persons with disabilities cannot effectively deal with the afore- mentioned problems. Advancing supported forms of employment can facilitate the employment of those previously considered unemployable, provide assistance to other types of persons with employ-ment needs, and increase their chances of success in employment. It will ease the em-ployment pressure in the Southwest China’s ethnic minority area.

 

In contrast with the employment of persons with disabilities by influencing em-ployers’ behavior, supported employment, on the one hand, improves the employabili-ty of persons with disabilities through support in job matching and vocational training. On the other hand, it reduces employment risks and costs for people with disabilities through measures such as job site support and wage subsidies for employers, thereby realizing employment in a way that affects both the labor market and the supply and demand sides. It is a balanced form of employment for both parties. As mentioned earlier, the slow pace of economic development in this region results in narrow em-ployment channels for the disabled and a relatively low employment level. In the short term, the existing employment environment cannot be improved, and neither regular employment nor specific forms of employment of persons with disabilities can effec-tively play the role of employment promotion.

 

The core feature of supported employment is that the state and society effectively support persons with disabilities who have employment needs. This policy can ef-fectively enhance the employment rate of persons with disabilities in practice. In the early supported employment survey conducted in the United States, after intensive training, severely mentally-disabled persons participating in supported employment services were able to work independently in the food, laundry and transport sectors for about one year with an average annual salary of US $3,500. ²³

 

In our country, the successful case of the supported employment pilot project units conducted by China Association of Persons with Intellectual Disability and their Relatives also proves that it can help adults with intellectual disabilities acquire appro-priate jobs and considerable income, and reduce the burden on families and countries, which is in line with China’s national conditions. Therefore, advancing supported em-ployment will add new impetus to the employment of persons with disabilities in the region, and enrich the employment system for persons with disabilities in the ethnic minority areas in Southwest China.

 

 

In recent decades, fighting against discrimination and exclusion, and the promo-tion of integration have become the trend of the international disability movement, with social integration as a core concept of disability issues and being gradually re-flected in international human rights law and numerous domestic laws and policies. The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities takes “full and effective participation and social integration” as one of the general principles and calls upon the contracting party to take measures to promote the work of persons with disabilities in an open and inclusive labor market environment; in other words, to integrate this group instead of isolating them has become the current form of employment for per-sons with disabilities advocated internationally.

 

More important, supported employment enables disabled people to receive wages above their minimum wage, equivalent to their jobs and workloads. Compared to tra-ditional concentrated employment and pro-employment, supported employment can better help people with disabilities receive substantial income, improve their economic conditions and improve their quality of life.

 

Supported employment has enabled people with disabilities to be paid at least the minimum wage and be engaged in competitive work in mainstream workplaces. In practice, persons with disabilities who work in mainstream and converged places will enjoy greater improvement in terms of people-to-people exchanges and their social lives.²⁴ More important, supported employment enables disabled people to receive wages above their minimum wage, equivalent to their jobs and workloads.²⁵ Com-pared with the traditional concentrated employment and employment by ratio, sup-ported employment can better help people with disabilities receive substantial wages, improve their economic conditions and improve their quality of life.

 

Harmonious ethnic relations are crucial to the stability and economic develop-ment of Southwest China, even the unification of the country. The elimination of eth-nic segregation, ethnic exchanges, or the promotion of national integration, is crucial for the building of harmonious national relations. The focus in safeguarding harmoni-ous ethnic relations has been shifted from the political rights and interests of all eth-nic groups to the economic and cultural rights of all ethnic groups.²⁶ As a vulnerable group, the employment and economic status of disabled persons further demonstrates social fairness and justice, which greatly affects the ethnic harmony. According to the second national sample survey of disabled persons in 2006, the surveyed households with disabled persons in the southwest minority areas have a per capita income lower than the national average of 3,002 yuan. In terms of the number of disabled persons surveyed with the absolute poverty per capita income below 683 yuan, the figures of Guizhou, Yunnan and the Tibet autonomous region surpass the national average.

 

The above shows that the existing form of employment of persons with dis-abilities in the ethnic minority areas in Southwest China cannot guarantee disabled people’s access to a decent living standard. A considerable number of people with disabilities cannot work and can only maintain basic subsistence through state aid and are isolated from mainstream society. Therefore, promoting supported employment with the goal of convergent employment that provided equal pay for equal work will, on the one hand, advance the participation of local people with disabilities in social integration so as to push forward ethnic exchanges and integration in the region to a certain extent and lay a foundation for harmonious ethnic relations. On the other hand, in view of the current poor economic status of disabled people in Southwest China’s ethnic minority areas, supported employment helps people with disabilities in the region get a regular wage that matches their job and workload through supported measures, which also promotes their income growth through employment, offering a material guarantee for ethnic harmony in the region.

 

Supported employment is a form of employment for persons with disabilities involving multiple participants such as the government, service providers for the dis-abled and employers. Compared with other forms of employment, supported employ-ment has an intensive and complex workflow that requires professional careers coun-selors to increase success rates. In addition, the effectiveness of its implementation is affected by other relevant factors. It should be preceded by the following:

 

 

Supported employment is a professional process that requires the cooperation of the state, social organizations, employers and disabled people. Therefore, accurate po-sitioning and rational planning play an important role in its implementation.

 

At present, in the pilot areas of supported employment in China, Hunan prov-ince has adopted a top-down promotion model led by the government in which social organizations also participate. The government in Hunan has promulgated the first provincial-level supported employment program for people with mental disabilities, in which it has clearly defined the objectives, steps, supervision and evaluation, as well as the financial support it is , achieving good results in prompting the local supported employment theory research and practice, and embarking on a professional path that exhibits effective teamwork.

 

In 2012, ethnic minorities in Hunan’s ethnic minority autonomous regions ac-counted for 77.04 percent of the total population,²⁷ while the total number of disabled persons with mental and intellectual disabilities accounted for roughly the same proportion of the total disabled persons as they did in Sichuan province, Yunnan province and Chongqing.²⁸ It thus has a similar background with that of southwest ethnic mi-nority areas, and its way of implementing supported employment is worth studying for applying in Southwest China. It is suggested that top-level design and macro-planning for supported employment in Southwest China’s minority nationality regions should be strengthened. Supported employment, as a form of employment for persons with mental and intellectual disabilities, should be included in the system of employment of persons with disabilities. After being scaled up in practice, it can gradually develop into a form of employment for persons with disabilities, which serve all types of peo-ple with disabilities with employment needs. On this basis, it is necessary to clarify the roles and responsibilities of the government, service providers, employers and disabled persons in supported employment, and to positively consider the differences between the ethnic minority areas in Southwest China and other regions in terms of the structure of persons with disabilities, regional economic development, social orga-nizations and social awareness in the implementation of supported employment, so as to promote the supported employment in the region with a rational planning and over-all layout.

 

 

The European Union, which conducted a survey of supported employment prac-tices in the 30 countries within the European Union and the European Free Trade Association in 2011, made policy recommendations and considered that one of the prerequisites for the successful establishment and implementation of supported em-ployment was the existence of a supporting legal framework. Even though supported employment can be successfully implemented by non-governmental and private orga-nizations through bottom-up measures, an institutional and legal framework can ad-dress many of the issues involved, such as access to funds, incentives and sources of work. The establishment, or long-term development, of supported employment should seek to establish a national policy framework and optional national projects.²⁹ The concluding two-year pilot project, conducted by the China Association of Persons with Intellectual Disability and their Relatives, also pointed out that supported employment is a systematic social project and cannot be completed without the support of policy. Therefore, a legal and policy system is the basis and motivation for the development of supported employment.

 

To promote supported employment in southwest ethnic minority group areas in the southwest of the county, corresponding legal policies should be enacted and promulgated according to local conditions in the southwest ethnic minority areas to establish the legal status of this policy in the employment of local disabled people. The government, social organizations for the disabled, disabled persons and employ-ers should play different roles in the implementation of supported employment, with the funds, employment counselor training and management system in the region improved. The incentives system for employing disabled persons and the monitoring and evaluation system of supported employment service agencies should also be im-proved. At the same time, the system of public announcement of employment by ratio should be improved to promote the implementation of supported employment and create more jobs for supported employment. The construction of such a system will provide a good legal environment for advancing supported employment in the ethnic minority areas in Southwest China.

 

 

Although supported employment can be promoted by non-governmental orga-nizations, the lack of a government-led employment model means individual orga-nizations working alone lack development resources such as funds and professionals to guarantee the long-term growth of supported employment. In countries such as the United States and Ireland, which have mature experience for effective implementa-tion, their governments play an important role in providing the important links for supported employment such as institutional construction, financial support and orga-nizational projects. The above shows that the government’s position in advancing the policy is indispensable and irreplaceable.

 

In the ethnic minority areas in Southwest China, a large proportion of the popula-tion has a disability and it is particularly important to solve the employment problem for people of ethnic minority people with disabilities. According to the survey, people with disabilities in ethnic minorities have greater employment enthusiasm and initia-tive, while this group is more dependent on the government and more trusting of it, preferring to seek employment through the local federation of disabled persons and other government departments.³⁰

 

In other words, the promotion of supported employment in the ethnic minority areas I Southwest China has a good social foundation for the government playing a leading role. In addition, according to a site visit of the Chengdu Benevolence Family for the Disabled in June 2016, under the leadership of the Wuhou District Government in Chengdu, by adopting the government-provided service, the Benevolence Family for the Disabled successfully launched supported employment services in 2015.

 

The Benevolence Family for the Disabled in Chengdu provides professional ser-vices for supported employment, with professional counselors and employment and training offered through cafes, car washes and laundries to help people with mental disabilities achieve regular employment. This shows that it is feasible for local gov-ernments to implement supported employment for there is a successful example of a government promoting supported employment. Therefore, we should recognize the role of local governments in promoting supported employment in the ethnic minority areas in Southwest China and give full play to the leading role of the government in such aspects as system construction, financial support and supervision and administra-tion in the process of implementing supported employment.

 

 

According to recent research in Chengdu and Beijing, the main issues currently affecting supported employment in general, as perceived by the interviewed support-ed employment services organizations, include conflicts between the employment of disabled persons and the granting of national welfare allowances, worries about safety in the employment of disabled people, and their limited access to jobs. The enabling conditions for the promotion of supported employment include a flexible social se-curity system linking employment and welfare grants, the special education model that provides personalized pre-employment training, a barrier-free environment, and smooth implementation of the employment system by ratio.

 

In the case of ethnic minority areas, in Southwest China, the above conditions are still relatively weak. Take barrier-free construction for example, in 2015, the number of prefectural-level regions with barrier-free construction across the country accounted for 70.1 percent and that of county-level regions was 48.6 percent. Apart from the systematic construction of barrier-free construction in the county-level areas in Chongqing, the aforementioned two ratios in Sichuan were 33.3 percent and 16.4 percent respectively; those in Guizhou province were 22.2 percent and 27.3 percent; those in Yunnan province were 31.3 percent and 53.5 percent respectively. In the Tibet autonomous region, there are no areas with systematic barrier-free construction.³¹ In addition, as mentioned above, the employment system by ratio that provides a source of work for supported employment has also been less effective than the national aver-age in ethnic minority areas in Southwest China.

 

In this area, we should focus on nurturing the supported employment system by exploring and trying out a flexible local social security systems for people with disabilities, strengthening the construction and maintenance of a barrier-free environ-ment, making good use of special education and teaching resources in the region, so as to construct a transfer mechanism for special education and supported employment. Under the background of intensifying the employment system throughout the country, efforts should be made to explore ways to improve the effect of employment by ratio in the region in light of the actual conditions in the ethnic minority areas in Southwest China and to provide supported employment of different levels in different industries. A support system should be established to advance the development of supported em-ployment through the above measures.

 

 

With supported employment becoming an international employment trend for persons with disabilities and the practice of this policy increasing in China, there are is great significance in promoting supported employment in the Southwest China in view of the particularity of the employment of disabled persons and their develop-ment needs in ethnic minority areas. Based on the pilot experience both at home and abroad, we need to explore ways to promote the practical operation in light of the actual situation of the population structure of the disabled population, the employment status of the disabled and the corresponding legal policies in the region, in order to construct a supported employment pattern with the characteristics of southwest ethnic minority areas and promote the employment of local disabled people while advancing supported employment universally.

 

(Translated by YU Nan)