Mental Health at the Crossroads

This book is a challenge to the enduring status and domination of bio-medical approaches in mental health services. Contributors from four continents argue that this domination, along with modernization and multidisciplinary work, will not improve people's lives unless social and psychological perspectives are appreciated and integrated. This implies new forms of relationships and social arrangements. Mental Health at the Crossroads: the Promise of the Psychosocial Approach is a timely analysis of the psychosocial approach as it resonates across the discipline divide, considering the past and future development. It is written from the perspectives of service users and carers, managers, practitioners, educators, researchers and policy makers, illustrated with case studies from Australia, Brazil, Italy, UK and the USA. This book presents an alternative approach to conventional thinking in mental health, providing a fascinating and valuable resource for those seeking new perspectives, grounded in theory with practice examples, in order to influence the current agenda and change practice.

Shulamit Ramon is Professor of Interprofessional Health and Social Studies at Anglia Polytechnic University, Cambridge, UK. Janet E. Williams is Senior Lecturer in Social Work at Sheffield Hallam University, Sheffield, UK.

Contents: Foreword, David Pilgrim; Introduction, Janet E. Williams and Shulamit Ramon. Part 1 Mental Health at the Crossroads: Towards a conceptual framework: the meanings attached to the psychosocial, the promise and the problems, Shulamit Ramon and Janet E. Williams. Part 2 Contextualised Social Policy: Agenda and Priorities: Control, citizenship and risk in mental health: perspectives from UK, USA and Australia, Neil Foster; Contextualised social policy: an Australian perspective, Bill Healy and Noel Renouf; Contextualised social policy: agenda and priorities - a UK perspective, Pauline M. Prior. Part 3 Paradigm Shift: Process and Outcomes: Paradigm shift in psychiatry, Duncan Double; Paradigm shift in psychiatry: processes and outcomes, Roberto Mezzina; Structural issues underpinning mental health care and psychosocial approaches in developing countries: the Brazilian case, Eduardo Mourão Vasconcelos; Developing self-defined social approaches to madness and distress, Peter Beresford. Part 4 The Psychosocial: Experience and Practice: The place of recovery, Jan Wallcraft; Self-help/mutual aid as a psychosocial phenomenon, Carol Munn-Giddings and Thomasina Borkman; The informal caring experience: issues and dilemmas, Joan Rapaport; Living with trauma, Janet E. Williams; Mental health promotion, Shulamit Ramon; Re-introducing the psychosocial in training, education and research, Julia Jones and Catherine Gamble; Spirituality and mental health: an integrative dimension, Phil Barker and Poppy Buchanan-Barker; Index.