Diseño accesible, universal o inclusivo, ¿es lo mismo?

En el artículo The Same, But Different: Breaking Down Accessibility, Universality, and Inclusion in Design explican las diferencias y semejanzas de tres términos relacionados, accesible, universal e inclusivo:

Accessibility is a goal
We use the term accessibility to describe a vast network of activity, but, in the most basic terms, when we talk about a site or an app, we describe its progress toward accessibility in basic terms — it’s good, it’s bad, it’s ugly. The goal of everyone I know in the accessibility community is to make things better for as large an audience as possible. So here’s definition number one:

Accessibility is the goal to ensure that products support each individual user’s needs and preferences.


Universal design is for everyone, literally
Universal design is the design of products and environments to be usable by all people, to the greatest extent possible, without the need for adaptation or specialized design.


Inclusive design expands with your audience
Unlike universal design, there are not yet generally agreed-upon definitions for inclusive design, or the practices it encompasses. Some attempts borrow heavily from the above definition of universal design. Some are more mission statements than definitions. Some are explicitly connected with disability, while others are broader in scope. All of them have some value, in that they confront the reader with the idea that it is always within their capacity to do more.

The definition of inclusive design that I identify most with comes from the Inclusive Design Research Centre at OCAD U in Toronto:

We have defined Inclusive Design as: design that considers the full range of human diversity with respect to ability, language, culture, gender, age and other forms of human difference.

Inclusive design is a term that leads people to think about an expanding audience, with expanding wants and needs, which, in turn, gives them more to think about as they design products. When I say, “I’m working on inclusive design,” I get substantially fewer blank stares than when I said, “I work on accessibility.” More often than not, the connection to the needs of people with disabilities comes through on its own.