Testing equality: insanity, treatment refusal and the CRPD
Testing equality: insanity, treatment refusal and the CRPD
The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities is considered to be a radical international treaty that affords persons with disability recognition and protection of equal rights in socio-cultural, political, medical and legal arenas. Drawing from the Convention's core principles of equality and non-discrimination, the High Commissioner for Human Rights and the Convention's Committee have called for a replacement of the insanity defence with a disability-neutral doctrine. The rationale is that retaining this special defence is, in itself, discriminatory, given its function is necessarily based on the presence of mental disability and the assumption that such disabilities impair capacity and reasoning. This article interrogates the rationale behind ‘abolitionist’ views, and asks whether equality necessarily means treating all persons identically regardless of capacity to reason about conduct.
CRPD, equality, insanity defence, treatment refusal
174-185
Wondemaghen, Meron
ffb7f092-1b45-4e9d-94d5-52484047961f
4 March 2018
Wondemaghen, Meron
ffb7f092-1b45-4e9d-94d5-52484047961f
Abstract
The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities is considered to be a radical international treaty that affords persons with disability recognition and protection of equal rights in socio-cultural, political, medical and legal arenas. Drawing from the Convention's core principles of equality and non-discrimination, the High Commissioner for Human Rights and the Convention's Committee have called for a replacement of the insanity defence with a disability-neutral doctrine. The rationale is that retaining this special defence is, in itself, discriminatory, given its function is necessarily based on the presence of mental disability and the assumption that such disabilities impair capacity and reasoning. This article interrogates the rationale behind ‘abolitionist’ views, and asks whether equality necessarily means treating all persons identically regardless of capacity to reason about conduct.
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e-pub ahead of print date: 1 October 2017
Published date: 4 March 2018
Keywords:
CRPD, equality, insanity defence, treatment refusal
Identifiers
Local EPrints ID: 421370
URI: http://eprints.soton.ac.uk/id/eprint/421370
ISSN: 1321-8719
PURE UUID: 8fcadee0-af48-4234-95ba-c0d343128ef2
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Date deposited: 06 Jun 2018 16:30
Last modified: 15 Mar 2024 20:14
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Author:
Meron Wondemaghen
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