Why research on disability and inequality must include people with disabilities

As a youth with a disability who has been in the disability space for the last five years in Kenya, I am familiar with the challenges that result when disability is left out of conversations.

Although there are a lot of initiatives pushing for greater equality, disability is still not central in discussions around inequality. This is even though people with disabilities are more likely to experience inequalities in income, representation and recognition than our non-disabled counterparts.

I was part of a research study exploring the links between disability and inequality activists, and how to improve collaboration between the two. This blog explores my experience.

An opportunity to stop hiding my disability

Looking back, I often think about the years I spent hiding my disability just to fit into a society that insists on defining what is “normal” and what is not. I moulded myself to those standards because the world around me wasn’t ready to meet me where I was.

This really affected my self-esteem, and I had to undergo mentorship and work preparedness sessions to overcome that feeling. Even in the workplace, where laws in Kenya require that at least 5% of employees are persons with disabilities, the reality paints a different picture. Many organisations still struggle to include people with disabilities. Sometimes it’s a lack of resources to provide reasonable accommodations, but often it’s simply a lack of knowledge or awareness. Whatever the reason, the result remains: unintentional exclusion, but exclusion all the same.

After graduating from university, I sent out countless job applications. Silence met almost every one of them. It wasn’t long before I realised that indicating my disability on my CV might have been one of the reasons I wasn’t being shortlisted.

Going through LinkedIn in 2024 and seeing an advertisement for a research assistant with lived experience of disability made me feel hope, relief and a genuine sense of being seen. Instead of being excluded I was explicitly invited. This also gave me the hope of seeing other people with disabilities genuinely included.

I was invited into that workspace because I can contribute, not for tokenistic inclusion. Like many people with disabilities, I have a range of expertise, and we can all make our practices properly inclusive if we give people a chance.

Exploring collaboration between disability and inequality activists was a learning opportunity

Many of my own experiences and challenges were echoed by peers with disabilities involved in the study. Together, our experiences show there is a need for genuine collaboration between policymakers, employers, disability rights activists, inequality rights activists and funders. If we are truly committed to the principle of “leaving no one behind”, we must work together to actively create an environment in which inclusion is not symbolic but practical and sustained. Engaging with research participants with disabilities enabled me to recognise how my own experiences of ableism and tokenism were shared by others across different contexts. Participants talked about experiences of being included in name only, without meaningful influence or adequate support.

Working closely with the research team deepened my understanding of how disability intersects with wider structural inequalities. And by working with study participants, I explored how disability and inequality campaigners frame the connections between disability and other lived experiences, the barriers that hinder collaboration and the actions required to strengthen collective efforts. The consistency between participants’ narratives and my own experiences underscored how limited resources for accessibility shape perceptions and practices of collaboration, often influenced by donor priorities and institutional constraints.

As a research assistant I was involved in every stage of the study, from design and interviews to focus group discussions and workshops. Throughout, I observed how peers with disabilities brought multi-layered perspectives and shared experiences that reinforced the urgent need for more collaborative, intersectional strategies for disability inclusion. I also saw the importance of centring disabled people’s knowledge and leadership within research and advocacy processes.

Making action-research accessible

As part of the study, we asked disability and inequality activists to reflect on what prevents them from collaborating and what would help to overcome these barriers. From this, we co-created strategies and tools for improving collaboration.

Making our action-research accessible and inclusive was a key priority. We made a number of adjustments to ensure everyone could participate fully. Sign language interpreters were available, and we funded a range of personal assistants, visual aides and support workers. We produced Easy Read versions of consent forms, information sheets and guides to interviews and focus groups. We also translated research tools, information sheets and consent forms into Swahili in Kenya and Twi in Ghana.

In the first stage of the study, interviews with activists provided great insight into the barriers that hinder collaboration. We also met with an engagement group, including representatives from United Disabled People of Kenya, the Ghana Federation of Disability Organisations and other colleagues, to reflect on the initial findings and plan next steps. Focus groups then gave us an opportunity to gain deeper insights into emerging themes, and for participants to recommend possible strategies to enhance collaboration between disability and inequality activists in Kenya and Ghana.

We then brought together study participants and other activists from organisations championing issues of disability and inequality. This workshop created a participatory and empowering space in which activists with and without disabilities co-created solutions. This workshop reinforced the value of inclusive knowledge production and strengthened trust and collaboration among participants. Nothing about us, without us

Disability intersects with many inequalities. Yet our study reveals persistent challenges to collaboration across the justice and disability sectors, such as ableism, tokenism, attitudinal barriers and limited or deprioritised resources for accessibility. To truly advance equity, there is a need for intentional inclusion.

Together we’ve developed tools and resources grounded in real experiences to widen the potential for collaboration, building powerful connections and prompting fresh narratives between inequality and disability activists.

Find out more at the webinar Uniting for change: strengthening collaboration between disability and inequality activists on 4 March 2026 at 1pm UCT/GMT.

This publication was made possible thanks to funding from the Atlantic Fellows for Social and Economic Equity (AFSEE) programme, based at the International Inequalities Institute at the London School of Economics and Political Science.