Intersectionality, Disability, and Access to Higher Education in Nigeria: An Administrative Justice Framework

This study develops an Administrative Justice Framework for analysing and addressing the intersectional barriers faced by students with disabilities in accessing and completing higher education in Nigeria. Students with disabilities in Nigerian universities experience compounded disadvantages arising from the intersection of disability status with gender, socioeconomic class, ethnicity, and geographic origin. Existing frameworks for disability and inclusion in Nigerian higher education administration have addressed these dimensions in isolation, failing to capture their intersectional dynamics and systemic administrative production. The study employs a transformative mixed methods design. The quantitative phase surveys 280 students with disabilities and 120 disability support administrators from 10 universities across the South West, South East, South South, and North Central zones. The qualitative phase involves 40 in-depth biographical interviews with students with disabilities and 15 expert interviews with disability rights advocates and senior university officials. Intersectionality Theory, the Social Model of Disability, and an Administrative Justice Framework inform the theoretical design. Data are analysed using intersectional quantitative analysis, biographical narrative analysis, and critical discourse analysis. Findings demonstrate that disabled female students from low-income rural households face the most severe access barriers, and that these barriers are systematically produced and reproduced through administrative policies, built environments, and institutional cultures that operate as if disability, gender, and class exist independently. The study makes original theoretical contributions by constructing a first empirically grounded Intersectional Administrative Justice Model for Nigerian higher education. Recommendations address legal reform, universal design in campus planning, and intersectionality-sensitive disability support services. Keywords: intersectionality, disability, higher education access, administrative justice, Nigeria.