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Mental Health Policy and Governance

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The Palgrave International Handbook of Healthcare Policy and Governance

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Abstract

Policy-makers in the mental health field, including governments and professionals, have to try to deal with a range of issues that are sometimes in tension and conflict. A key issue that has often dominated policy objectives is to provide some means of controlling the actual and potential dangerousness of those who have severe mental health problems and are in lay terms ‘mad’. This is an especial problem given that the public very frequently sees the dan- gers posed as greater than they are in reality and tends to blame professionals if they have not detained someone who then commits a violent crime. Hence policy-makers feel the need to respond to the fears of the public as well as to the actual risks of dangerous and disruptive behaviour that some individuals with a severe mental illness may present, and have typically used mechanisms such as compulsory powers of detention and, more recently, compulsory com- munity treatment orders (CTOs) in order to do so — compulsory powers that are ultimately subject to legal oversight.

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Essex, UK

    Joan Busfield (Professor of Sociology)

Authors
  1. Joan Busfield
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Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Karolinska Institutet, Sweden

    Ellen Kuhlmann

  2. University of Canterbury, Christchurch, New Zealand

    Robert H. Blank (Adjunct Professor) (Adjunct Professor)

  3. Institute of Population Health and the Telfer School of Management, University of Ottawa, Canada

    Ivy Lynn Bourgeault (Professor) (Professor)

  4. University of Siegen, Germany

    Claus Wendt (Professor of Sociology of Health and Healthcare Systems) (Professor of Sociology of Health and Healthcare Systems)

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© 2015 Joan Busfield

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Busfield, J. (2015). Mental Health Policy and Governance. In: Kuhlmann, E., Blank, R.H., Bourgeault, I.L., Wendt, C. (eds) The Palgrave International Handbook of Healthcare Policy and Governance. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137384935_29

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