For me, the key significance of the "Autistic Spectrum" lies in its call for, and anticipation of, a politics of Neurological Diversity, or Neurodiversity. The "Neurologically Different" represent a new addition to the familiar political categories of class/ gender / race and will augment the insights of the social model of disability.
The rise of Neurodiversity takes post-modern fragmentation one step further. Just as the post-modern era sees every once too solid belief melt into air, even our most taken-for granted assumptions: that we all more or less see, feel, touch, hear, smell, and sort information, in more or less the same way, (unless visibly disabled) are being dissolved.
Citation: Singer, J (1997) “Why can’t you be normal for once in your life? From a problem with no name to a new category of disabiity” in Corker, M and French, S (eds) (1998) Disability Discourse Open University Press, UK