ABSTRACT
Speaking to an academic audience, Dame Tanni Grey-Thompson (2006), then the leading medal winner in the history of the Paralympic Games, noted the remarkable convergence of the Paralympic and Olympic movements. From pragmatic beginnings as part of the treatment of spine-injured ex-servicemen towards the end of the Second World War, disability sport has developed so rapidly that it now supports sport-specific national squads of elite athletes participating in international competition. As the summit of disability sport, the Paralympic Games have played a major part in changing social attitudes by emphasizing achievement rather than impairment and by accelerating the agenda of inclusion. They have also forced changes in official attitudes in countries where disability was ideologically problematic, if only to accommodate international opinion when bidding for the Olympics – given that the Paralympics are now closely linked to that process (Gold and Gold, 2007).
