Disability and Work Topics 101: Moving Beyond Allyship: Disability Inclusion and Accompliceship

Authors: Elmira Izadi, Rachel Bath, Michelle Willson

From Allyship to Accompliceship

In our last Disability and Work Topics 101 post, we dove into the topic of allyship and what it can look like in practice. We explained what allyship is and how you can be an ally. Allyship means actively supporting people and communities who experience discrimination, exclusion, or other barriers. Allies may speak up against unfair treatment of others, advocate for fairness, or use their privilege to support inclusion^1,4.

This work matters. Creating more equitable and inclusive workplaces requires people to recognize barriers that may not affect them personally and take action to address them. When people use their voices, influence, and resources to support communities experiencing discrimination, they can help create workplaces where more people are able to participate and succeed^1,4.

But not all allyship has the same impact.

In our previous post, we also discussed the difference between performative and meaningful allyship. Performative allyship may involve expressing support without taking meaningful action to address the barriers people face. Meaningful allyship, on the other hand, requires ongoing learning, listening, reflection, and action. It means putting support into practice rather than simply saying the right things¹.

Meaningful allyship is important, but there is still significant work to be done to create workplaces and communities where everyone has equitable access, opportunities, and decision-making power. Addressing these deeper inequalities can require people to go beyond individual acts of support and take action that challenges the policies, practices, organizational processes, and social norms that create barriers in the first place^1,2,5,6.

Sometimes, taking this kind of action involves greater personal or professional risk. For example, a person might question a long-standing workplace practice, challenge a decision made by someone with more authority, push for resources to improve accessibility, or advocate for changes that are unpopular or uncomfortable. When someone works alongside marginalized communities to challenge systemic barriers and is willing to take on greater risk in doing so, this is often described as accompliceship^2,3,5,6.

Being an accomplice means taking action to help create deeper, systemic change, or joining the fight for change^2,6. Accomplices work alongside marginalized communities that experience discrimination and systemic barriers to identify and change the systems and structures that contribute to inequality^2,3. Systems and structures are the policies, practices, organizational processes, social norms, and established ways of doing things that shape how people experience workplaces and society. Even when they were not intentionally designed to exclude anyone, they can create barriers or unequal opportunities for some people^2,3.

For example, consider the hiring scenario at the beginning of this post. An accomplice would go beyond simply noticing that the interview process may create barriers and would take action instead of waiting for candidates to request an accommodation. They might raise the issue during the planning process and work with their team to make the process accessible from the start. This could include offering alternative assessment formats, clearly communicating that accommodations are available, and questioning whether a handwritten assessment is necessary at all. In this way, accompliceship is one way people can deepen their commitment to equity and inclusion. It asks people not only to recognize and respond to barriers, but also to consider what it may take to change the conditions that created those barriers in the first place^3,5,6.

Accompliceship and Risk

A defining feature of accompliceship is a willingness to take on greater risk in pursuit of systemic change⁷.

Allies may support inclusion while remaining relatively safe within existing systems. Accomplices, however, may challenge decisions made by managers, senior leaders, HR departments, or others with organizational power. They may also disrupt harmful workplace norms, such as treating accommodations as an inconvenience, expecting every employee to work in the same way, or making decisions about accessibility without involving people with disabilities. They take these actions even when speaking up may create discomfort or consequences for themselves^2,3,6.

Accompliceship can take many forms. It might mean challenging an inaccessible hiring process before candidates encounter it, using your position on a committee to ensure people with disabilities are involved in decisions, advocating for funding to improve accessibility, or questioning workplace norms that treat accommodations as an inconvenience. It could also mean sharing decision-making power, directing attention and opportunities toward colleagues with disabilities, or supporting their leadership rather than speaking for them. These actions may not always be well received. An accomplice may risk being criticized by colleagues, viewed as difficult, excluded from informal networks, or facing barriers to career advancement. While these outcomes are not guaranteed, accomplices recognize that meaningful change may require accepting some level of personal or professional risk^3,5,6,7.

This does not mean accompliceship always requires dramatic public action. Instead, it means recognizing that meaningful change often requires people with power and privilege to use those positions to challenge systems that benefit some while excluding others^1,2,5,6.

The goal is to use one’s influence thoughtfully and responsibly to remove barriers, even when doing so feels uncomfortable or challenges the status quo.

Pause and Reflect: Where Do You Have Influence?

You do not need to be a senior leader to have some form of power or influence. Think about your role, relationships, knowledge, and access to decision-making.

• What workplace decisions, processes, or conversations can you influence?
• Are there meetings or decision-making spaces you can access that others cannot? If so, are there ways you can help others have access to or influence in these spaces?
• When could you invite people with disabilities into a conversation rather than speaking on their behalf?
• Are there policies, practices, or unwritten expectations that create accessibility barriers?
• What discomfort or consequences might come with taking action?

Accompliceship is about changing existing conditions that create barriers for marginalized people, not just about supporting marginalized people^2,3.

Accompliceship in Disability Advocacy

Within disability advocacy, accompliceship builds on allyship by placing more emphasis on structural change. While allyship focuses on supporting people with disabilities and advocating for their inclusion, accompliceship goes further by working alongside disability communities to identify and change the policies, processes, practices, and norms that create accessibility barriers. While allies may ask, “How can I help this person navigate this barrier?” accomplices ask, “Why does this barrier exist in the first place, and how can we remove it?” This means recognizing that much of our workplaces, services, technologies, and public spaces were designed without people with disabilities in mind or even involved in the process^2,6. As a result, barriers are often embedded into how these systems operate, whether through inaccessible hiring processes, workplace policies, transportation systems, or physical environments.

To act as an accomplice in disability advocacy means working alongside disability communities to challenge these structural barriers. This may involve pushing organizations to redesign processes with accessibility in mind from the outset, advocating for policy changes that embed accessibility into law, or ensuring that people with disabilities get to decide how they want to live their lives. Accomplices work to ensure that people with disabilities have leadership and decision-making roles when designing systems and spaces, they recognize accessibility as a shared responsibility rather than an individual burden, and they challenge workplace cultures that treat accommodations as exceptions or inconveniences⁸.

Accompliceship as an Ongoing Commitment

Like allyship, accompliceship is not a fixed identity or title. It is an ongoing practice that requires accountability and continued action. There is no final point at which someone “becomes” a perfect accomplice. In fact, there is no “perfect” accomplice^2,6!

As workplaces, communities, and our understanding of inclusion continue to evolve, new barriers and opportunities for change will emerge. Being an accomplice means staying open to feedback, reflecting on your own actions, and continuing to learn from the communities you want to support. It also means continuously recognizing when existing policies, practices, or norms are creating barriers and being willing to help change them^1,6.

Accompliceship is not about having all the answers. It’s about making a long-term commitment to creating more accessible, equitable, and inclusive workplaces and communities, even when that requires continued learning, uncomfortable conversations, or challenging how things are^1,2,6.

Ready to Make Change?

If you’d like to learn more how you can help to create an inclusive workplace, see our articles on creating inclusive workplaces for neurodivergent workers and building culturally safe and inclusive workplaces for Indigenous Peoples with disabilities.

To learn about inclusive employment support in your community, find a CCRW location near you and explore our accessible employment services and inclusive workplace supports for people with disabilities, 2SLGBTQIA+ individuals, and other equity-deserving communities across Canada.

References:

1. Suyemoto, K. L., Hochman, A. L., Donovan, R. A., & Roemer, L. (2021). Becoming and fostering allies and accomplices through authentic relationships: Choosing justice over comfort. Research in Human Development, 18(1-2), 1-28. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15427609.2020.1825905
2. Jones, J. C. (2021). We need accomplices, not allies in the fight for an equitable geoscience. AGU Advances, 2(3). https://doi.org/10.1029/2021av000482
3. Clemens, C. (2017). Ally or accomplice? the language of activism. In Race & Ethnicity Rights & Activism [Article]. https://www.salisbury.edu/administration/diversity-and-inclusion/_files/anti-racism/ally-or-accomplice-the-language-of-activism.pdf
4. Wolbring, G., & Lillywhite, A. (2023). Coverage of allies, allyship and disabled people: A scoping review. Societies, 13(11), 241. https://www.mdpi.com/2075-4698/13/11/241
5. Moore, K., & Cox, M. (2021). Allies, Advocates, and Accomplices: A Critical Look at the Relationships Between white and Black women in Engineering Education. ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition. https://doi.org/10.18260/1-2--36660
6. Green, N. S., & Condon, F. (2020). Chapter 15. Letters on Moving from Ally to Accomplice: Anti-Racism and the Teaching of Writing. In The WAC Clearinghouse; University Press of Colorado eBooks (pp. 277–292). https://doi.org/10.37514/per-b.2020.0360.2.15
7. Jackson, R. G., Huskins, K., Skelton, S. M., & Thorius, K. K. (2020). Ally & Accomplice: Two Sides of the Same Coin. Equity Dispatch. Volume 4, Issue 3. Equity Assistance Center Region III, Midwest and Plains Equity Assistance Center. https://files.eric.ed.gov/fulltext/ED623053.pdf
8. Government of Canada. (2024, October 10). Best practices in equity, diversity and inclusion in research. https://sshrc-crsh.canada.ca/funding-financement/nfrf-fnfr/edi-eng.aspx