Contesting Psychiatry: Social Movements in Mental Health

by Crossley; Nick

• ISBN13: 9780415354165
• ISBN10: 0415354161
• Edition: 1st
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2006-02-10
• Publisher: Routledge

Summary

Sociologists have written much about power in relation to psychiatry and mental health services. Until now, however, there has been little research on resistance to this power, whether in the form of individual crusades or the collective efforts of social movements. As a result, a central thread in the social constitution of the mental health system has been overlooked. Contesting Psychiatry explores the history of resistance to psychiatry between 1950 and 2000, and more particularly, the history of the social movements who have mounted this resistance, calling psychiatry into question. Key features include: an account of the key social movements and organizations who have contested psychiatry over the last fifty years the theorization of resistance to psychiatry which might apply to other national contexts and to social movement formation and protest in other medical arenas the exploration of theories of power in psychiatry Original and provocative in its approach,Contesting Psychiatry offers a new sociological perspective on psychiatry. It is essential reading for students and academics alike and a unique contribution to the sociological understanding of psychiatry and medicine.

Author Biography

Nick Crossley is a Professor of Sociology at the University of Manchester, UK.

Table of Contents

List of illustrations	viii
Acknowledgements	ix
Introduction: researching resistance	1	(12)
1 Social movements, SMOs and fields of contention	13	(17)
2 A value-added model of mobilisation	30	(17)
3 Contextualising contention: a potted history of the mental health field	47	(22)
4 Mental hygiene and early protests: 1930-60	69	(30)
5 Anti-psychiatry and 'the Sixties'	99	(27)
6 Parents, people and a radical change of MIND	126	(18)
7 A union of mental patients	144	(20)
8 Networks, survivors and international connections	164	(27)
9 Consolidation and backlash	191	(18)
Notes	209	(4)
Bibliography	213	(8)
Index	221