Main description:

This critical interdisciplinary study charts the modern history of mental health services, reflects upon the evolution of care in communities, and considers the most effective policies and practices for the future.
Starting with the development of community care in the 1960s, Cummins explores the political, economic, and bureaucratic factors behind the changes and crises in mental health social care, returning to those roots to identify progressive principles that can pave a sustainable pathway forward.
This is a groundbreaking contribution to debates about the role, values, and future of community care, and is vital reading for students, teachers, and researchers in the field of social work and mental health.

Contents:

Introduction
Community care: a brief overview
The asylum and the community
Inquiries
Deinstitutionalisation and the penal state
Reform or revolution? Mental health legislation and the development of community care
International perspectives
Neoliberalism, advanced marginality and mental health
Conclusion