The Arts and Social Inclusion

The movement to social inclusion varies in ambition and method. Some claim that disadvantaged groups can only regain a stake in the community by whole communities moving together to renew a sense of citizenship. For others the starting point is economic inclusion – opportunities for disadvantaged people to gain the benefits and conveniences enjoyed by others such as a bank account, a job of work and spending power.

For those suffering mental distress, the barriers are of course broader than economic.

Stigma and discrimination of one sort or another has influenced the integration of people with mental health problems since the dawn of time.

Foucault, Goffman, Szasz and others have explored how society has habitually embraced rationality and is driven to divide off and deny experiences that are confusing and disturbing.

In recent centuries the creation of institutions physically segregated those who have these experiences, labelling them mad, generating and enshrining stigma. The institutions served society’s need to ensure that reason and ‘unreason’ need no longer communicate.

Current good practice in mental health aims at helping people to regain a place in the mainstream, but our fragmented society is more ambivalent. Much of society still demands protection against the anxiety caused by an exposure to experiences which are not readily susceptible to understanding. The fear of a ‘contagion of unreason’ is still with us today and may even be increasing as our lives are ever more rationally driven. Society demands that mental health services continue to provide a reliable buffer, now justified in the name of public safety.