Dr. Jerome Bickenbach is a professor at the University of Lucerne and professor emeritus at Queen’s University. He is co-group leader of the Disability Policy and Implementation Research unit at Swiss Paraplegic Research, Nottwil. He has a PhD in political philosophy and a law degree, and was a practising human rights lawyer for several years.
Bickenbach’s research interests include disability studies, health sciences, rehabilitation in primary care, and health systems studies focusing on rehabilitation and ageing.
Bickenbach is the author of books such as Physical Disability and Social Policy (1993) and Ethics, Law and Policy (2012), as well as numerous articles and chapters on disability studies focusing on the nature of disability and disability law and policy. He is also editor or co-editor of books such as Introduction to Disability (1998), Quality of Life and Human Difference (2003), Disability and the Good Human Life (2014), Assessing Disability in Working Age Population (2015) and The Changing Disability Policy System (2017). From Disability to Practice (2018) is a collection of essays on his academic work by colleagues.
From 1995 to 2005, Bickenbach worked at World Health Organization on drafting and implementation of the International Classification of Functioning, Disability and Health (ICF) and international disability social policy. He has been principle investigator on several European Commission research grant-supported projects on disability-related issues, and is currently a consultant for the WHO, the World Bank, the OECD, UNICEF and the EC on reform of disability assessment in Eastern European countries.