Intersectionality and Persons with Disabilities: Celebrating 20 Years of the CRPD
News | June 29, 2026
This piece is written by Elizabeth Lockwood, CBM Global’s Representative at the United Nations, and Dulamsuren Jigjid, CBM Global Board Member, as part of our CRPD at 20 series marking 20 years of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities.
As we mark the 20th anniversary of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD), we celebrate the progress made in advancing disability rights around the world. But this anniversary is also a reminder that disability rights cannot be fully realized without understanding the different and intersecting barriers persons with disabilities face.
Intersectionality is a concept of how multiple identities, such as gender, disability, age, race, indigeneity, and others overlap to shape individual and group experiences. For example, a young deaf Indigenous woman living in a rural area. These intersections result in distinct discrimination or disadvantage due to power imbalances. People do not experience discrimination in only one way. Different aspects of identity can overlap and create distinct forms of exclusion and oppression, especially for those who are already underrepresented or marginalised. The term intersectionality was introduced in 1989 by Kimberlé Crenshaw[i] and continues to be applied in different sectors. By adopting an intersectional lens, we can ensure that efforts lead to truly transformative and inclusive processes.
The CRPD itself implicitly recognizes intersectionality, particularly in Article 6 (Women with disabilities) and Article 7 (Children with disabilities). However, the broader implementation of intersectional approaches remains inconsistent across countries and institutions.
As CBM Global, we have been actively engaging in intersectional work, especially around data. In 2025, CBM Global’s Representative at the United Nations, Elizabeth Lockwood, authored the Open Data Watch report “Intersectional Data and Persons with Disabilities” that highlights partner organizations of persons with disabilities (OPDs) and we co-led (as the Stakeholder Group of Persons with Disabilities) the drafting of the Collaborative on Citizen Data’s Guidance on Intersectionality. Subsequently, in June 2026, Elizabeth represented CBM Global in the International Statistics Institute conference in Malta where she presented on intersectional data and persons with disabilities with key partners. Following this, Elizabeth presented on intersectionality in two events CBM Global co-sponsored at the 19th session of the Conference of States Parties to the CRPD at the UN in New York.
CBM Global’s Board Member, Dulamsuren Jigjid, also presented in these events sharing key learnings from OPD-led projects that link to intersectionality. Jigjid advocates for extending the principle of intersectionality to disability data collection itself. She highlights that the exclusion of persons with disabilities from the data-gathering process, whether through the use of proxy respondents, caregivers, or inaccessible methods like the absence of sign language, leads to data that misrepresent lived realities. This is especially true for marginalized groups, such as deaf individuals whose needs are already often overlooked. Jigjid proposes data systems that equally value official statistics and community-generated evidence led by OPDs. She argues that community data effectively captures the barriers and intersecting marginalizations that large-scale official surveys frequently miss. In her words, the disability movement’s core principle of “nothing about us without us” must now be complemented by “nothing about us without data.”
Marking the CRPD’s 20th anniversary is not only a moment of celebration but also a call to action in which States Parties, civil society, the United Nations, and international organizations:
- Embed intersectionality into disability policies and frameworks,
- Strengthen the most underrepresented and marginalized groups within the disability community,
- Invest in inclusive and accessible data systems and accountability mechanisms, including recognition of citizen data especially led by OPDs, and
- Ensure that current and future global agendas leave no one behind.
As we look ahead, intersectionality can lead to more inclusive policies, stronger disability representation, better and more disability data, and solidarity within the disability movement and amongst other social movements.
In case you missed the earlier pieces in our CRPD at 20 series, you can also read Mary Keogh’s blog on why laws matter but people make change, watch the video by José Viera, Executive Director of the International Disability Alliance, and read the blog by Bonface Massah, Executive Director of the Africa Albinism Network, and David Bainbridge, Executive Director of CBM Global Disability Inclusion, on protecting persons with albinism from violence, fear and injustice.
https://cbm-global.org/news/intersectionality-disability-rights-crpd-20-years
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