From institutionalisation to (de)institutionalisation – transferring isolation practices from nursing home care to supported housing in Poland
From institutionalisation to (de)institutionalisation – transferring isolation practices from nursing home care to supported housing in Poland

Summary/Abstract: During the COVID-19 pandemic, discussion re-emerged in many places, among them Poland, about how institutions that provide nursing home care (NHC) contribute to the social isolation of their residents; deinstitutionalisation (DI) as an alternative to collective forms of housing, in the form of sheltered housing and assisted housing, was brought to the fore. The aim of the research was to analyse these forms of housing in terms of the way deinstitutionalisation is perceived and understood by the creators of protected and assisted housing for people with disabilities. The applied perspective is the concept of the permeability of an institution, placed on a continuum between “permeable” and “total”. The research also employed a critical discourse analysis, which included 20 statutes concerning protected and assisted housing. The results of the analysis indicate that there is a practice of transferring elements of institutional thinking and limiting human rights to those forms of housing that are intended to be an introduction to (or an implementation of) the idea of DI. The concepts of sheltered and assisted housing still include many features that may be identified with “total” institutions on the permeability continuum.

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