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| Title: |
Critical Psychiatry |
| Published: |
1st March 2004 |
| ISBN: |
185343793x |
| Price: |
£18.95 | $29.95 |
.jpg) “Critical Psychiatry”, edited by David Ingleby, was first published in 1980. Its seven essays were strongly influenced by the debates over psychiatry which had raged in the 1960’s and 1970’s. While some details in the book have inevitably become dated, its basic theme – the contrast between the size of the problem of ‘mental illness’ and the inadequacy of responses to it - seems even more relevant now than a quarter century ago. Today, diagnoses of mental illness have reached staggering levels: the WHO has estimated that depression will become the second most important cause of disability worldwide by 2020, and the major cause in the developed world. Yet psychiatry is increasingly dominated by crudely reductionist biomedical models and a one-sided reliance on drug treatments. Theoretical perspectives which present a challenge to the mainstream are marginalized, while standardised treatment protocols and diagnostic manuals have suppressed the diversity of approaches which characterised the field thirty years ago. This book makes a strong plea for critical thinking about the conceptual foundations of psychiatry, about its social role, and about the issues of power surrounding mental illness. Far from being merely an historical document, “Critical Psychiatry” is powerfully relevant to mental health services today.
Contents
David Ingleby – Understanding ‘mental illness’
Joel Kovel – The American mental health industry
Peter Conrad – On the medicalisation of deviance and social control
Sherry Turkle – French anti-psychiatry
Andy Treacher and Geoff Baruch - Towards a critical history of the psychiatric profession
Franco Basaglia – Breaking the circuit of control
Svein Haugsgjerd – Report from Norway
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