[Excerpt] The past ten years have witnessed a marked change in the legal and policy responses of many European countries, and of the EU itself, to the issue of disability. This new (and still emerging) response is often termed the ‘rights based approach’. In this paper I will attempt to clarify the nature of this approach and to suggest a number of ways in which disability organisations might work towards establishing it in their own countries. My starting point will be a brief examination of the more traditional approach to disability, however, as it is difficult to grasp the essence of the new approach without an appreciation of its contrast with the old.