This interview is a conversation between Luis Gerardo Arroyo Lynn and Justin Karter.

Luis conducted this conversation in his role as an editor of Mad in Mexico. Established in September 2021, Mad in Mexico is not just an extension but an essential limb of the international initiative of Mad In America. Its mission resonates with the core values of challenging conventional thinking around mental health, focusing on the Spanish-speaking communities of South and Central America as well as the United States.

Luis graduated from Universidad La Salle and is now pursuing a masterā€™s degree in Social Psychology of Groups and Institutions at UAM Xochimilco. He is currently conducting research on ā€œDepsychiatrization of Mental Health,ā€ with an interest in the fields of critical psychology, anti-psychiatry, and anti-speciesism.

Luis is in conversation today with Mad in Americaā€™s own Justin M. Karter, whose multidisciplinary work stands at the intersection of psychology, philosophy, mad studies, and global mental health. As a counseling psychologist, an Instructor for the Center for Psychological Humanities & Ethics at Boston College, and the lead research news editor at Mad in America since 2015, Justinā€™s approach to mental health goes beyond clinical practice.

In the spotlight is Justinā€™s research titled ā€œInclusion Toward Transformation: Psychosocial Disability Advocacy and Global Mental Health.ā€ This study, completed in August 2021, addresses pressing concerns in modern mental health discourse. It critiques the prevailing Western notions that shape the Movement for Global Mental Health (MGMH) and champions a rights-based perspective, considering cultural, political, and economic conditions.

This interview explores the crux of Justinā€™s research, examining the transformative potential of an integrated psychosocial disability framework. By interrogating and deconstructing mainstream discourses, this conversation promises to shed light on how we can better serve those with lived experiences of mental distress, transcending traditional boundaries and embracing a more rights-based, inclusive approach. This conversation aims to redefine the way we approach mental health, madness, psychiatry, and psychological suffering, in a world that desperately needs a compassionate, critical perspective.

 

The transcript below has been edited for length and clarity. Listen to the audio of the interview here.

 

Luis Arroyo: So, the idea of this interview or conversation is to discuss your dissertation and other articles youā€™ve written about Global Mental Health, particularly focusing on the relationship established with the psychosocial disabilities movement and activism. Right now, Iā€™m working on a project exploring how activism is driving significant changes in the way we think about mental health. During my research, however, I find myself getting stuck in situations where mental health and psychiatry discourses seem to exploit these circumstances. They base their own narratives on activism, making them appear progressive but in an almost extractivist way.
Ā When I began reading your articles and thesis, I was inspired. Itā€™s remarkable work, and I thought to myself, ā€œMore people need to know about this, read about it, and be aware of these situations.ā€ So I sent you some topics to discuss, along with specific questions. The idea is to see where the conversation takes us, aiming for something more flexible. But the first topic, the one with which I want to start, is ā€œWhat is Global Mental Health?ā€ Initially, I thought of it as a discourse established by the WHO, a psychiatric discourse. But in the article ā€œThe Poison in the Cure,ā€ you made a distinction between Global Mental Health and the WHO.

Justin Karter: Yeah, first, thanks for your interest in this work. I think itā€™s an important topic that hasnā€™t received much attention within the psychological and psychiatric disciplines, particularly in the Global North. I mean, the movements of consumers, survivors, ex-patients, scholarship, and activism have been largely marginalized in our professional disciplines. Now, paying attention to the way psychosocial disability, both as an identity and an advocacy framework, has challenged our fields and hasnā€™t really been acknowledged or talked about as a transformative discourse. So yeah, I welcome more attention to it.

Also, Iā€™m not a person with a psychosocial disability, and Iā€™m a researcher in the Global North. So there are all these limitations to my own understanding that I want to acknowledge. I hope that it can serve as a bridge to some extent, inviting other professionals to make the effort to start to listen to these voices and engage with the scholarship in a way that I think could be transformational for our discipline. It could also improve conditions of treatment for people worldwide.

Starting with that, what is the Global Mental Health Movement? Well, itā€™s tough to define, right? Because itā€™s amorphous, and there are lots of institutions involved. There are lots of different conceptualizations and treatment approaches captured within this larger framework of Global Mental Health. But for most, the movement of Global Mental Health is connected to the Lancet Commission. The Lancet is a leading medical journal, and the Lancet Psychiatry Commission report on Global Mental Health has been led by Vikram Patel and many other well-known psychiatric scholars. From the outset, it was also connected to institutional players like the World Health Organization, the World Bank, and even the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.

The idea, as you mention in the article with Dr. Cosgrove, ā€œThe Poison in the Cure,ā€ was that thereā€™s an economic and political incentive globally for improving mental health treatment. The idea was that the Global South has a large number of people that might be suffering from mental health conditions, and these conditions were preventing people from being productive laborers or citizens. This was hampering the Global Southā€™s attempts to increase GDP and reach the economic productivity of the Global North. Thereā€™s a lot thatā€™s problematic about this narrative, and we can pick it apart a bit, but that was the economic framing initially. The global community helped to shape mental health treatments in the Global South that would have helped these countries achieve such an economic standard that could improve their conditions.

 

Arroyo: I was thinking about a situation that you mentioned regarding your own perspective on the field. Since youā€™re not a person with a psychosocial disability and youā€™re also a researcher from the Global North, you identified this as a kind of limitation in discussing counter-discourses and various perspectives. You made it clear that this existing condition might influence your viewpoint. Before we continue with the topics, I was wondering if this specific situation made your research more complicated or if it perhaps gave you some advantages. How do you deal with these kinds of situations when talking about psychosocial disabilities without being seen as part of an extractivist system?

Karter: Itā€™s a complicated question, and I think it cuts both ways. As someone with the privilege of being in academic disciplines in the Global North and being a white researcher, society affords me certain privileges. These allow me to impact the discourse in specific ways. Iā€™m taken seriously as a researcher and granted access to institutions that normally exclude people with psychosocial disabilities, such as psychiatric conferences and events from the American Psychological Association.

To the extent that Iā€™m able to faithfully represent the interests of groups that Iā€™m not a part of, I believe I can be influential. Itā€™s important to have allies that help push the narrative forward. However, the risk lies in how my own interests, both consciously and unconsciously, influence how I represent the work. I also have to work within certain constraints in academia or as a graduate student, whether itā€™s the pressure to publish quickly or to translate the language of those with lived experience into recognizable academic jargon to be seen as a serious researcher.

All these pressures can distort the message in a way that may co-opt it and make it more digestible to the psychiatric or psychological establishment or may lead me to speak for people when they can speak for themselves. So I think itā€™s essential to be conscious of both sides of this ā€“ the ways I can be helpful and influential and how I can leverage my privilege to make space for this movement in areas where space is not being made. At the same time, I must recognize my limitations and the ways in which I might not always be a faithful ally and be open to feedback when that happens.

I donā€™t think thereā€™s any clear answer except for acknowledging the tensions on either side and trying to take a stand on shaky ground. I had a professor in my masterā€™s program, Bob McInerney, who gave a great lecture on how all our concepts are constructed on shaky ground, but we still have to decide what matters to us, what our values are, and what weā€™re willing to fight for. So I try to take a stand for what feels right at the moment, even when caught in the paralysis of questioning my role and influence and remain open to learning from my mistakes.

 

Arroyo: I was reflecting on the moment when I started to read your dissertation, ā€œInclusion Toward Transformation.ā€ When you discuss psychosocial disability as a counter-discourse against the psy complex, specifically in the Global South, it made complete sense to me. But simultaneously, I was contemplating the particular difficulty you were navigating, being from the Global North and speaking about the Global South. At least from my perspective, when I read it, I felt that you were genuinely respectful of the discourses of people with lived experience.
Ā Returning to ā€œInclusion Toward Transformation,ā€ you describe psychosocial disability as an umbrella term that covers psychiatric survivors, mad persons, and other identities. So, do you think thereā€™s a difference in being referred to in one way or another? Does it imply something different, or is it all part of the same identity?

Karter: I think that there are really important differences, and the language we use to understand ourselves and our experiences is super important. The language itself opens up possibilities for understanding how to respond, and it can also obscure other ways of responding. In my research, I found that psychosocial disability, as a term coming from the Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities in the UN, offers a new framework. It provides an umbrella term that many different people worldwide, with different advocacy experiences and narratives about their mental distress, have embraced. Many of these groups had previously interacted and debated, but some had not.

Not only does psychosocial disability offer a way for people to advocate against psychiatric discourse and act as a counter-discourse, but it also works to bring people with different counter-discourses together, creating productive friction. Often in political organizing, groups that are resisting may splinter and fight among themselves, preventing a unified front against the oppressor regime theyā€™re fighting against. This could happen under the psychosocial disability framework, but it seems, at least from the participants I was able to work with, that there are core conditions they agree upon. They disagree on many things but agree on letting people come to their own narrative about their experiences. They acknowledge that people may have a strong connection to their own story and believe that people should be allowed to have that and revise it over time.

The reason why thereā€™s such a strong belief in allowing people to come to their own understandings is that they didnā€™t want to replicate the power dynamics experienced in psychiatric settings, where somebody says, ā€œThis is whatā€™s going on with you, this is the true story about your psychotic episode.ā€ They donā€™t want to replicate that dynamic, so they allow room for disagreement and respect peopleā€™s process of doing so.

Specifically, you mentioned psychiatric survivors versus psychosocial disability. I see psychosocial disability as an umbrella term that serves a very pragmatic purpose. Itā€™s an identity for some and a legal category tied to human rights discourse and a disability advocacy framework. It offers a way of speaking back to psychiatric practices worldwide that demands an answer, whereas previous discourses like psychiatric survivors, ex-patient, or mad studies could be ignored or marginalized. Psychosocial disability, with its legal significance and support from organizations like the UN, forces psychiatry to respond.

The term psychiatric survivor started in the United States, and one of my participants pointed out that it still centers on psychiatric discourse. If you come from a community that doesnā€™t have a strong psychiatric history, with no asylums, etc., there may not be something to be a survivor of. People are hesitant to define themselves in opposition to an institution they never really interacted with, and sometimes they wish for more access to treatment within a human rights framework, without imposition or involuntariness. They would like more access to medication, psychotherapy, and informed, culturally appropriate services.

There was some tension about the term psychiatric survivor in the Global South, as it doesnā€™t always make sense to people in communities without a long legacy of psychiatry, in the same way that it makes sense in the United States as it developed in the 1970s.

 

Arroyo: I was thinking that the term ā€œpsychiatric survivorā€ is hard to find, at least in Mexico City. I havenā€™t encountered it easily, and I think thatā€™s because of what you mentioned: thereā€™s not a background of psychiatric abuse in the same way as in the United States. By saying this, I donā€™t mean to imply that thereā€™s no abuse by psychiatry in Mexico; of course, there is, but it occurs in a different context and situation than in the United States.
Iā€™m recalling that in the United States, the police are more aligned with psychiatric institutions, allowing police to intervene in certain situations. This is something that doesnā€™t happen as often in Mexico, so I believe these are some of the distinctions explaining why the concept of ā€œpsychiatric survivorā€ is not as commonly used here in Mexico.
Additionally, with the idea of psychosocial disability serving as both a legal category and an identity and having the background of advocacy for human rights or alignment with the UN and the Convention, it is somewhat forcing psychiatry to acknowledge this concept and respond. I think that Psychiatry isnā€™t really answering to the people with lived experience but rather to other institutions and ā€œauthoritiesā€ in this sense. So, in that context, do you think itā€™s possible to discuss mental health outside of psychiatric discourse, or is psychiatric discourse always implicit when we talk about mental health?Ā 

Karter: Itā€™s a good question, and I wonderā€”and Iā€™m not answering from a point of expertise but from a point of curiosityā€”whether, as things have become so globalized and the Global North has played such a role in colonizing not just the institutions of the Global South, but the language and concepts, it is becoming less and less possible to exist outside a baseline discourse that has been influenced by Western psychiatric history. There might still be places where that is more possible than others, but I think that at some level, it might be the case that alternatives are held as alternatives rather than primary treatments because the primary approach seems to be this sort of Western biomedical set of concepts or framework.

Itā€™s sort of like asking, are there ways of experiencing sadness or feeling distraught without implicitly invoking the concept of depression, which is rooted in Western language and psychiatric practice? I think yes, but itā€™s increasingly more difficult not to have that as part of your implicit framework when youā€™re trying to understand what is going on with your mood.

 

Arroyo: With that, I just talked with Tina Minkowitz about a book she wrote, ā€œRe-Imagining Crisis Support: Matrix, Roadmap, and Policy,ā€ and in the conversation, she mentioned, ā€œWell, maybe ā€˜crisisā€™ isnā€™t the best word, as it brings us back to psychiatry.ā€ Distress, sadness, even feelings, affections, and perceptions always lead us back to the idea of ā€œIs it normal or not normal?ā€ and ā€œShould we, or can we, medicate it?ā€

Karter: The notion of emotions being rooted in the individual is consistent with Western enlightenment philosophy. This view posits that feelings are contained within us and are personal possessions rather than manifestations of complex interactions involving our relationships, the world around us, and the material universe we engage with daily. This individualistic perspective can limit our language and understanding, making it challenging to explore more nuanced concepts. For example, how can we articulate what it means for an emotion to be interpersonal or relational, rather than solely an individual experience? This issue goes beyond mere semantics, touching on profound questions about the interconnectedness of our feelings with others as we speak, our shared history, our ancestry, and the various factors present in our interactions. Such a holistic perspective recognizes emotions as dynamic and emergent phenomena, shaped by complex interplay rather than isolated within individual minds.

 

Arroyo: With that, Iā€™m going back to ā€œInclusion Toward Transformationā€ because I think I remember a part in which you mention that advocacy groups in the Global South are defying the idea of Global Mental Health. They argue that it doesnā€™t take into account the context and political aspects, seeming to focus only on particular situations, as you mentioned. With that in mind, how can we start to think about mental health outside the psychiatric discourse and approach it from a lived-experience perspective? How can we shift the scenario, and what role are advocacy groups playing in making that change possible?

Karter: Itā€™s a great question, and I wish I had a clear answer. I think I have two different lines of thought. One is sort of philosophical, which means that we need to denaturalize psychiatric concepts. In the sense that we examine them, we must recognize that the plural discourse of psychiatry, when speaking about our mind, is speaking about our essence and our natural brain function, as if it has a scientific basis to it. I think we need to continue to challenge that and to open up space for counter-discourses that question these ideas. This way, culturally, we can be open to thinking differently.

The first step is kind of like shaking things up, so we donā€™t work with assumptions in the back of our mind, such as ā€œwe are really talking about a brain disorder, that itā€™s purely a chemical imbalance,ā€ or things like that. We need to continue to shake that up, and I think people are doing important work on that front so that weā€™re open to other ways of thinking.

And then I think there should be the institutional change that guarantees the full and effective inclusion of people with psychosocial disabilities, or however, they are defined, but also offers protections against co-option, marginalization, and discrimination within those spaces.

This change must take into account the importance of having people with specific experiences from the local community, culture, and religious background involved in the research. Itā€™s not like you can pick someone with a psychosocial disability from the Global North and have them be part of a panel on Global Mental Health in your local area, like Mexico City, and assume that theyā€™ll know everything. They must also be able to correct for all the misconceptions that occur when applying a Western psychiatric framework to Central America, right? So we also need to be thoughtful about that, and I think thatā€™s something we can do legally, structurally, and institutionally.

We can put safeguards in place and make guarantees about what needs to happen, who needs to be included, and what boxes need to be checked in order for research to be funded, to be in compliance with the UNCRPD, and to align with the Human Rights framework thatā€™s been endorsed by whatever NGO or foundation that is funding the research or the university institutional review board. There are practical things that have been done and can continue to be done to make those kinds of spaces possible and to challenge the discourse in the places where itā€™s being constructed and developed.

 

Arroyo: With what you mention, itā€™s important to give people the chance to participate in these spaces while being aware of the position that people are taking. As in the example, a person with a psychosocial disability from the Global North wonā€™t be the same as a person from the Global South. And Iā€™m starting to think, how can we avoid individualizing these situations again? Because human rights advocacy and the Convention talk about reasonable adjustments, and all that kind of stuff has to be made specifically for every case and situation. Itā€™s not the same adjustment for one person as for another, but rather it takes into account the social context.
Iā€™m thinking about that scenario in a really superficial way. Maybe someone could say, ā€œItā€™s the exact same thing; psychiatry says that mental health is an individual situation that requires individual treatment, and the Convention says exactly the same thing, but in other words.ā€ So, I know itā€™s hard to answer, but what do you think about that situation, and how can we avoid that comparison?

Karter: Itā€™s an essential question that underscores a paradox: the human rights framework, though rooted in Western enlightenment and the philosophy of the Global North, has become a powerful tool for advocating rights and inclusion. But like any framework, it reveals certain truths while obscuring others, making some issues clear while leaving others hidden and challenging to advocate for.

Consider the dilemma of harm versus benefit, which might echo psychiatric discourse by asking, ā€œDo the side effects outweigh the benefits?ā€ Itā€™s vital that we continue to interrogate the limitations of the Human Rights framework even as we employ it for advocacy. We may say, ā€œWeā€™re using this framework to improve lives and legal rights,ā€ but we must also recognize that we might be missing critical perspectives within this very approach.

What are the known unknowns? What aspects are we failing to consider because our framework doesnā€™t even allow us to recognize them? We must actively seek out these blind spots, examining the frameworkā€™s edges and asking questions about its limitations, much like you are doing. One notable limitation youā€™ve identified is the persistent focus on the individual.

The complexity of mental distress requires a multifaceted exploration, considering everything from history, social environment, politics, economics, community, and religious beliefs, to family dynamics. These factors interplay in profound ways, shaping our experiences and perceptions. The existing frameworks, focused on individualistic concepts, struggle to grasp these intricate relationships. We are in desperate need of frameworks that can adequately reflect this complexity, even though they may be messy and difficult to apply.

Prominent thinkers like transcultural psychiatrist Laurence Kirmayer and sociologist Nikolas Rose are already exploring how to develop concepts that embrace this complex interplay. And indeed, these frameworks are often inherent in mad studies and the consumer, survivor, and ex-patient scholarship as well. They are striving to understand the multifaceted influences that shape a personā€™s unique experience of the world in a specific historical and cultural context.

As we improve our ability to articulate these nuanced frameworks, they have the potential to transform our understanding, even within the constraints of the Human Rights framework, which itself is built on the concept of individual rights. The challenge is vast, but the quest is vital; we must strive to understand the human condition in all its intricate complexity without losing sight of the broader social and cultural landscape that shapes and defines us.

 

Arroyo: From what you mention, I recall that in the article ā€œThe Poison in the Cure,ā€ you discussed the neoliberal system. You emphasized that itā€™s not merely an economic system, but one that constructs subjectivity, shapes the way we relate to one another, and instills the idea that individuals must take care of themselves. This leads to constant self-monitoring, creating a scenario defined by what could be called biopower.
The pandemic, I believe, has brought this situation to a boiling point. I canā€™t speak for your experience, but here in Mexico, I was required to fill out a daily report, monitoring my symptoms, such as feverish feelings or other signs of illness, and whether I had received the vaccine or not. This monitoring seems to disguise the underlying notion that the problem lies with the individual rather than society. It promotes the message that if you donā€™t care for yourself, no one else will, and this thought leads me back to the contemporary emphasis on self-medication.
Currently, weā€™re witnessing significant discourse on wellness, mindfulness, life coaching, and related concepts that place complete responsibility on the individual. The prevalent message is: ā€œYou have the opportunity to change yourself.ā€ Often, this is coupled with the idea of self-fulfillment, productivity, and striving ā€œto be more.ā€ These perspectives have a substantial impact on how we think about our mental health.
In this context, I think that recognizing psychosocial disability allows us to acknowledge and say, ā€œWell, Iā€™m not feeling good right now; Iā€™m feeling stressed, anxious,ā€ etc. It gives us the opportunity to genuinely experience and explore the wide spectrum of emotions that psychiatry often attempts to suppress or manage in some way.

Karter: There are many significant points to consider. First, operating within the neoliberal logic, we see the ideology that fuels capitalism and free markets. This ideology emphasizes individuals who must make rational choices in a market that decides winners and losers. It produces a certain type of person, forms of subjectivity, that permits this ideology to continue to function, allowing societies to ā€œwork.ā€ But here, ā€œworkā€ doesnā€™t necessarily mean producing well-being for people; it means keeping the system running, at least until it destroys enough of the planet that it ceases to function.

When we talk about this individual tendency, itā€™s essential to recognize that weā€™re swimming against a potent current. Living in neoliberal societies, itā€™s challenging to think of ourselves outside of those terms. Itā€™s like escaping history in a way; itā€™s exceptionally difficult.

The pandemic example is a good illustration of this. One way we can approach a pandemic, or spreading diseases, is through hyper-individualization and hyper-individual responsibility. Weā€™re all required to self-monitor continually, and the government assists us in this by providing systems that enforce this self-monitoring and individual accountability for disease spread.

But we can also envision a world where we think more about the conditions of the environment, the political and community conditions, and the overall health of the community. We might imagine more green spaces, more outdoor environments, and governments providing universal income to prevent people from having to expose themselves to dangerous situations to earn money.

We could think about it differently. The psychosocial disability framework invites us to consider what material and ideological environment produces experiences of disablement for a community or an individual. By articulating these thoughts, they become more susceptible to challenge and change.

If we instead focus on the disability within the individual, thinking about changing whatā€™s inside the person through medication, psychotherapy, or mindfulness, we miss what needs to change ideologically in the community, country, and world. We overlook changes needed in the physically built environment, such as access to green spaces, community areas that lead to healthy relationships, and rights that prevent discrimination, oppression, or bullying.

This shift in perspective, while seemingly simple, can reveal pathways toward challenging and transforming our existing structures.

But we must remember such a transformation is not aligned with the goals of neoliberal ideology. It may create communities that do not fit neatly into existing molds, that challenge rather than comply. And in that challenge, in that willingness to think and act differently, lies the profound opportunity for change.

 

Arroyo: I remembered a quote you mentioned in both ā€œThe Poison in the Cureā€ and ā€œInclusion Toward Transformation.ā€ Itā€™s from Rose and asks, ā€œWhat kind of creatures do we think we should become?ā€ You present this question as one that should challenge us, moving us beyond merely changing ourselves and leading us to consider how we might transform others and effect collective change.
I also wanted to mention an example you used in the article, where you discuss the Syrian refugee situation. You describe it as not merely a ā€œloss of their minds, but a loss of their worlds.ā€ Yet, the only alternatives we offer are medication and therapy, without any effort to change the material situation of the people. Itā€™s as if weā€™re saying, ā€œThe problem isnā€™t that you had to leave your country because it was being bombed; the problem is that youā€™re sad, so as long as youā€™re not sad, everything is okay.ā€ This leads me to ask, do we really want to become creatures that deny these situations and the experiences of others?
Additionally, and I recognize this is a complex question, what role should mental health professionals take in this new scenario and context? Should they participate within these new frameworks and counter-discourses, or should they step aside and let those with psychosocial disabilities and advocates for human rights take full control of the situation?

Karter: Such good questions, and itā€™s all very thought-provoking. I want to acknowledge that the quote, ā€œItā€™s not that they lost their minds, but that they lost their worlds,ā€ comes from psychiatrist Derek Summerfield, whoā€™s done really important work in pushing back against the Western conceptualization of depression, particularly in these combat zones.

So much to say: What role should mental health professionals play? In attempting to answer one question among many ā€“ what kind of creatures do we want to become, should we become, or would it be ethical for us to become ā€“ I wonder if having psychiatrists, psychologists, and psy disciplines involved in such a large way is good. I donā€™t think it is. I donā€™t think our disciplines speak to that question with new answers, complexity, or ethical understanding that other disciplines like literature, history, sociology, and anthropology might offer.

Yet, probably because psy disciplines fit so well within the neoliberal worldview, weā€™ve been afforded a very large megaphone to speak to these questions. Children, youth, and adolescents today are increasingly invoking psychological and psychiatric language to understand themselves and their relationships in a way that was unprecedented even a generation ago. I think the reason for that is because it fits with the prevailing ideology rather than challenging it. If our disciplines are being called to and given that megaphone, I think itā€™s important to have those within these disciplines think about the problems as loudly as possible and try to influence that discourse.

The question of what kind of people we might become makes us think about the ecological collapse of our planet and the disproportionate impact on humans in different positions. Are we capable of becoming the kind of beings that can face the coming tragedy, the destruction of our planet? If we are, what does that look like, and how do we get there? We must transform our psychological understanding of the self towards a more relational-ecological understanding of the human being.

We must move away from a capitalistic-neoliberal understanding of our role in the world, where we are not just extracting and exploiting for our benefit. We are mutually constituted by one another and our engagement with the world, the animals, and our whole ecological niche.

This transformation would take more than a change in psychological discourse; it would also involve the arts and humanities in articulating a different way of being a person and making those kinds of subjectivities accessible and possible, especially for young people.

In terms of the role of psychological disciplines, psychologists, and psychiatrists in the movements of people with psychological disabilities, I think itā€™s complicated and fragile. As we talked about earlier, we can agree to come alongside people with the understanding, ā€œI know something; some of those things might be helpful, and some might be harmful.ā€ We need to know more about what they need, how we can join them, and what we should not do. We must be able to form a relationship where they can let us know when weā€™re getting in the way, and we can let them know when we see something they might not have considered. We must do this from a place of mutual respect and understanding, not assuming that everyone wants that kind of person to come and accompany them. But when itā€™s welcome, we should think about how we can fill that role.

 

Arroyo: So, the participation of mental health professionals should always take the form of a question: ā€œWhat can we add? Should we leave?ā€ We must always try to establish this kind of dialogue when the response is expected to come from the other party.

 

 

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MIA Reports are supported, in part, by a grant fromĀ The Thomas Jobe Fund.

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Luis Arroyo Lynn
Luis Arroyo Lynn, Coordinator for Mad in MĆ©xico, is a psychologist and researcher. He graduated from Universidad La Salle with a degree in Psychology and is currently pursuing a Master's in Social Psychology of Groups and Institutions at UAM Xochimilco. He is currently conducting research on "Depsychiatrization of Mental Health."
Justin Karter
MIA Research News Editor:Ā Justin M. Karter is the lead research news editor for Mad in America. He completed his doctorate in Counseling Psychology at the University of Massachusetts Boston. He also holds graduate degrees in both Journalism and Community Psychology from Point Park University. He brings a particular interest in examining and decoding cultural narratives of mental health and reimagining the institutions built on these assumptions.

8 COMMENTS

  1. psychiatries in turkey report % 85 to schizophrenics. schizophrenics can never work with % 85 report. psychiatries say ‘why does not schizophrenics work’. this is imbalance. psychiatry diagnosed schizophrenia me because of the lies. psychiatry is a fake science. l hate from family and brother and mother and father and sister and the state. there is not right to conscientious objection in military service. the state in country request to forced solider.

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  2. The short answer to the question posed in the headline is: NO.

    This movement is an attempt to transform the mental health system into a political and policy-making system. The underlying causes of these difficulties do not lie in the realm of public policy.

    All that current public policy is doing is propping up a professional community that is not interested in solving the problem of mental health. They won’t be interested in solving the problems of poverty, poor educational opportunities, and cultural biases against the disabled either.

    Public policy and legal structures are ALSO preventing the resolution of what we could call “psychosocial disability” issues because they have gone crazy (if they weren’t always crazy). But the problem of taking control of those structures OUT of the hands of people who are crazy is a separate problem to the problem of solving mental and emotional distress. There are MANY aspects of life on Earth that would improve if the insane were totally denied access to the power structures of this planet. But this is our Ethics target. You have to get Ethics in to get Technology in. Otherwise, the out-ethics persons among us will simply block any technologies that they see as dangerous to their own survival. And the out-ethics people among us WANT us to feel crazy, oppressed, unable to work and all the rest.

    If we can get Ethics in in an area (the psychopaths out of control of that area) then the area can start a healing process, as long as it has the technologies it needs to accomplish this.

    This is how I have been trained to view this problem. It is silly to continue to complain about using the wrong technologies (bad public policy) when the system is controlled by psychopaths. Getting them out of power is called “getting Ethics in.” Using processes that actually work is called “getting technology in.” It involves a whole process of training (or re-training), organizing and so forth. When Ethics is out in an area, you have to get that in first.

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    • I am sorry but I don’t understand what you are saying.
      You said –

      “the problem of taking control of those structures OUT of the hands of people who are crazy is a separate problem to the problem of solving mental and emotional distress”.

      and

      “the system is controlled by psychopaths.”

      Are you trying to say that main stream mental health systems are being run by people who have lived mental health experience (often referred to as survivors) and this is the problem with our MH systems? This is completely contrary to my experiences in Australia where I live and work for MH reform.

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      • I think he’s saying that the people RUNNING the system exhibit “psychopathic” tendencies, which include lack of empathy, willingness to commit crimes to accomplish desired goals, willingness to lie, cheat or steal to get what they want, sometimes even a certain perverse enjoyment in watching others suffer. Overall, it speaks to a massive need to control others’ lives at their expense, and a lack of any concern for the welfare of anyone but themselves. This is a very rough and incomplete description, but such people are only rarely ever “diagnosed” with any kind of “Mental illness,” but rather tend to skate through life making trouble for others and getting others blamed for things they themselves have arranged. Those who are “caught” are more likely to be in jail than the “mental health” system, but plenty such people get into positions of power in businesses or government agencies where they have enough control to harm people while being protected from any kind of consequences. Of course, the world of psychiatry provides many such opportunities, and it would hardly be surprising if that field attracted a disproportionate number of psychopathic individuals, some of whom may be actually directing the course of the organization/profession.

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        • Hi Steve,
          The problem of hierarchical control and power structures and the abuses that can and often take place under them are well known in both western democracies and other societies. As you say, the people at the top of these organisation can inflict considerable distress on people under them but are rarely considered as being mentally ill. Sometimes they are even lauded as strong and effective leaders.

          I would also agree with you that it appears likely that the psychiatric profession as well as other mental health professions attracts more than its fair share of such people but to the best of my knowledge there is no credible research to prove this assertion. In any case it would probably be almost impossible to effectively measure.

          This however is a long way from the unproven and almost certainly incorrect assertion that “the system is controlled by psychopaths”.

          Mad in America has evolved into a forum for serious discussion and articles about mental health and mental health reform. I am aware that some senior government ministers reference this site for information. I respectfully suggest that if you want MIA to be taken seriously by global decision makers, then the editors/moderators need to do their job properly and ensure that erroneous and misleading claims like the one mentioned are corrected or removed.

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          • To be clear, I as moderator am not in the business of deciding what content or claims are accurate or inaccurate, thank the Lord! All I do is make sure that the comments fit the Posting Guidelines. There is no censorship on any kind of content-based grounds, and people are welcome to say more or less whatever they want, with very few exceptions regarding taking over the site with off-topic conversations that don’t advance the purpose of the website. It is the job of the Community at large to add their feedback and “correct” anything that seems exaggerated or unproven, just as you are attempting to do.

            MIA needs to be judged on the articles. No website anywhere I know of is judged by the comments people make on the articles. I assume “professional” people understand this and act accordingly.

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  3. Well done Luis & Justin, the concept of psychosocial disability can potentially transform mental health. The question arises in my mind as to whether there are variations in the numbers of people who are considered to have a psychosocial disability by region – and what is going on in those regions that have higher or lower numbers?? Does labelling someone as having a psychosocial disability helpful?? Does the very idea of psychosocial disability facilitate the forces of neoliberalism to enter a region?

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  4. In principal, I have no argument with the concept of psychosocial disability and its possible ability to define mental health divergence at a macro level. From a pragmatic point of view however, my question is what will it achieve other than more talk and academic articles?

    My involvement in mental health reform is at the micro level in a small global north country.

    The problems at this level as I see it are –

    1.The problems are complex and diversified.
    2.Many and probably almost all people at different levels of society are scared and mostly ignorant of mental health causes and issues particularly so called psychotic experiences.
    3.Because of items 1 & 2 there is little or no political will for change.
    4.Our values, certainly in global northern societies make it very easy for individuals and organisations to take advantage of the psycho-social distress that many people experience. They are able and in many ways are encouraged to capitalise on peoples problems with very little pushback although I think this is slowly changing. They appear to do this often without concern for the suffering of the people they take advantage of or at least with some pretty amazing rationalisation for their behaviour and activities.

    If I thought that an all inclusive label of psychosocial disability would be helpfull I would be all for it but I honestly can’t see it having much practical benefit or impact in the near term, at least in the grass roots area of mental health reform where I work.

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