5 ‘Clearing the streets’
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Ursula M. Read
Abstract
The removal of vagrant lunatics from the streets of African cities has a long history in the context of colonial and postcolonial urbanization. However, the emergence of rights-based approaches to mental illness as part of the growing influence of global mental health in Ghana has led to a reframing of this historical legacy within the context of mental health reform. The continued practice of forcibly removing persons with mental illness for treatment within the psychiatric hospitals aims to appease public concerns over growing homelessness among mentally ill persons. At the same time it is also deployed as evidence of efforts to enact new mental health legislation to international agencies. This case illustrates the entanglements and tensions arising from attempts to enact mental health reform in a way which resonates both with international psychiatric practice and human rights and with local expectations of social order and development.
Abstract
The removal of vagrant lunatics from the streets of African cities has a long history in the context of colonial and postcolonial urbanization. However, the emergence of rights-based approaches to mental illness as part of the growing influence of global mental health in Ghana has led to a reframing of this historical legacy within the context of mental health reform. The continued practice of forcibly removing persons with mental illness for treatment within the psychiatric hospitals aims to appease public concerns over growing homelessness among mentally ill persons. At the same time it is also deployed as evidence of efforts to enact new mental health legislation to international agencies. This case illustrates the entanglements and tensions arising from attempts to enact mental health reform in a way which resonates both with international psychiatric practice and human rights and with local expectations of social order and development.
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front matter i
- Contents v
- List of contributors vii
- Acknowledgements xi
- List of abbreviations xii
- 1 Global health and the new world order 1
- 2 Standardization and localization in tuberculosis control 29
- 3 The not-so-distant past, tuberculosis and the DOTS challenge 52
- 4 Decolonizing, nationalizing and globalizing the history of psychiatry 81
- 5 ‘Clearing the streets’ 103
- 6 You’ve got the point? 130
- 7 Finding the global in the local 154
- 8 Rare genetic disease, global health and genomics 183
- 9 The World Health Organization’s response to Ebola in historical perspective 207
- 10 Epilogue 230
- Index 247
Kapitel in diesem Buch
- Front matter i
- Contents v
- List of contributors vii
- Acknowledgements xi
- List of abbreviations xii
- 1 Global health and the new world order 1
- 2 Standardization and localization in tuberculosis control 29
- 3 The not-so-distant past, tuberculosis and the DOTS challenge 52
- 4 Decolonizing, nationalizing and globalizing the history of psychiatry 81
- 5 ‘Clearing the streets’ 103
- 6 You’ve got the point? 130
- 7 Finding the global in the local 154
- 8 Rare genetic disease, global health and genomics 183
- 9 The World Health Organization’s response to Ebola in historical perspective 207
- 10 Epilogue 230
- Index 247
