The meaning of housing models in Intentional communities for people with special needs: an invitation for critical thinking

In the last decades, the de-institutionalization movement has been expanding, which means the transition from life in institutions to life in the community, while aspiring to an independent life based on a concept of ability. Along with the movement to life in the community, in different models of housing for different population groups, the fear from this change is also increasing. Members of movements of people with disabilities and professionals alongside them, express concern that the models of community housing will reproduce in sophisticated ways the control and injustices that exist in institutional housing and in fact will constitute a deceptive reproduction of the institutional mechanism. Around the world there are intentional communities that operate community housing models. For example, models of joint family life - such as a family living with several people with special needs in a shared housing unit, or communities that have "houses for life" for several tenants. What is special about these models is their physical presence in the community space and the social mechanisms at their core, which drive integration and even community development for the entire community. The operating principles of these models allow meetings at events, visits to families, meetings at work and on sidewalks, and shared activities. Hence, both the residents of the "houses for life" and the members of the intentional communities develop a consciousness of inclusion that benefits all. Due to very little research on this topic, and due to the essentiality of knowledge for community integration processes that will expand in the future, as well as due to the importance of the topic as promoting human rights, the lecture will present data and implications from the Israeli experience. In addition, it will be possible to think together in preparation for an international study on this subject, which seeks to uphold the operating-principles of these models, as well as to enable critical thinking about the consequences for the residents and community members. People with life-experience in housing in intentional communities are certainly welcome to voice their experience and thoughts on the subject.