This book explores the human rights consequences of recent and ongoing revisions of mental health legislation in England and Ireland. Presenting a critical discussion of the World Health Organization's 'Checklist on Mental Health Legislation' from its Resource Book on Mental Health, Human Rights and Legislation, the author uses this checklist as a frame-work for analysis to examine the extent to which mental health legislation complies with the WHO human rights standards. The author also examines recent case-law from the European Court of Human Rights, and looks in depth at the implications of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities for mental health law in England and Ireland. Focusing on dignity, human rights and mental health law, the work sets out to determine to what extent, if any, human rights concerns have influenced recent revisions of mental health legislation, and to what extent recent developments in mental health law have assisted in protecting and promoting the human rights of the mentally ill. The author seeks to articulate better, clearer and more connected ways to protect and promote the rights of the mentally ill though both law and policy.
This book explores the human rights consequences of recent and ongoing revisions of mental health legislation in England and Ireland. Presenting a critical discussion of the World Health Organization's 'Checklist on Mental Health Legislation' from its Resource Book on Mental Health, Human Rights and Legislation, the author uses this checklist as a frame-work for analysis to examine the extent to which mental health legislation complies with the WHO human rights standards. The author also examines recent case-law from the European Court of Human Rights, and looks in depth at the implications of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities for mental health law in England and Ireland. Focusing on dignity, human rights and mental health law, the work sets out to determine to what extent, if any, human rights concerns have influenced recent revisions of mental health legislation, and to what extent recent developments in mental health law have assisted in protecting and promoting the human rights of the mentally ill. The author seeks to articulate better, clearer and more connected ways to protect and promote the rights of the mentally ill though both law and policy.
Getting Wrecked provides a rich ethnographic account of women battling addiction as they cycle through jail, prison, and community treatment programs in Massachusetts. As incarceration has become a predominant American social policy for managing the problem of drug use, including the opioid epidemic, this book examines how prisons and jails have attempted concurrent programs of punishment and treatment to deal with inmates struggling with a diagnosis of substance use disorder. An addiction physician and medical anthropologist, Kimberly Sue powerfully illustrates the impacts of incarceration on women’s lives as they seek well-being and better health while confronting lives marked by structural violence, gender inequity, and ongoing trauma.
Power, Suffering, and the Struggle for Dignity provides a solid foundation for comprehending what a human rights framework implies and the potential for greater justice in health it entails.
This book is the newest edition on the series ‘advances in psychiatry’. The previous 3 volumes can be found online at http://www.wpanet.org/detail.php?section_id=10&content_id=660 . They were highly successful in covering a broad area of psychiatry from different perspectives and angles and by reflecting both specialized but also international and global approaches. This series have guaranteed quality therefore can be used by different scientific groups for teaching and learning and also as a means for fast dissemination of advanced research and transformation of research findings into the everyday clinical practice.
Mental disorders are ubiquitous, profoundly disabling and people suffering from them frequently endure the worst conditions of life. In recent decades both mental health and human rights have emerged as areas of practice, inquiry, national policy-making and shared international concern. Human-rights monitoring and reporting are core features of public administration in most countries, and human rights law has burgeoned. Mental health also enjoys a new dignity in scholarship, international discussions and programs, mass-media coverage and political debate. Today's experts insist that it impacts on every aspect of health and human well-being, and so becomes essential to achieving human rights. It is remarkable however that the struggle for human rights over the past two centuries largely bypassed the plight of those with mental disabilities. Mental health is frequently absent from routine health and social policy-making and research, and from many global health initiatives, for example, the Millenium Development Goals. Yet the impact of mental disorder is profound, not least when combined with poverty, mass trauma and social disruption, as in many poorer countries. Stigma is widespread and mental disorders frequently go unnoticed and untreated. Even in settings where mental health has attracted attention and services have undergone reform, resources are typically scarce, inequitably distributed, and inefficiently deployed. Social inclusion of those with psychosocial disabilities languishes as a distant ideal. In practice, therefore, the international community still tends to prioritise human rights while largely ignoring mental health, which remains in the shadow of physical-health programs. Yet not only do persons with mental disorders suffer deprivations of human rights but violations of human rights are now recognized as a major cause of mental disorder - a pattern that indicates how inextricably linked are the two domains. This volume offers the first attempt at a comprehensive survey of the key aspects of this interrelationship. It examines the crucial relationships and histories of mental health and human rights, and their interconnections with law, culture, ethnicity, class, economics, neuro-biology, and stigma. It investigates the responsibilities of states in securing the rights of those with mental disabilities, the predicaments of vulnerable groups, and the challenge of promoting and protecting mental health. In this wide-ranging analysis, many themes recur - for example, the enormous mental health burdens caused by war and social conflicts; the need to include mental-health interventions in humanitarian programs in a manner that does not undermine traditional healing and recovery processes of indigenous peoples; and the imperative to reduce gender-based violence and inequities. It particularly focuses on the first-person narratives of mental-health consumers, their families and carers, the collective voices that invite a major shift in vision and praxis. The book will be valuable for mental-health and helping professionals, lawyers, philosophers, human-rights workers and their organisations, the UN and other international agencies, social scientists, representatives of government, teachers, religious professionals, researchers, and policy-makers.
This is the definitive textbook on global mental health, an emerging priority discipline within global health, which places priority on improving mental health and achieving equity in mental health for all people worldwide.
People with mental disorders often suffer the worst conditions of life.This book is the first comprehensive survey of the mental health/human rights relationship. It examines the relationships and histories of mental health and human rights, and their interconnections with law, culture, ethnicity, class, economics, biology, and stigma.
"This report presents compelling evidence that people with mental health conditions meet major criteria for vulnerability. The report also describes how vulnerability can lead to poor mental health, and how mental health conditions are widespread yet largely unaddressed among groups identified as vulnerable. It argues that mental health should be included in sectoral and broader development strategies and plans, and that development stakeholders have important roles to play in ensuring that people with mental health conditions are recognized as a vulnerable group and are not excluded from development opportunities. The recommended actions in this report provide a starting point to achieve these aims."--Page xxiv.
