Revisiting Hume's Law

Segal, Steven P.; Tauber, Alfred I.

doi:10.1080/15265160701638694

Cited by 6 publications

(7 citation statements)

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“…Future work may also need to distinguish between the scientific evidence of mental health and the arguments for mental health . Similar debates in bioethics 22 26–28 demonstrate the theoretical and practical limitations of science for proscribing human behaviour, especially with regard to individual freedom and social justice.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 87%

“…Several respondents framed the core concepts of mental health as descriptive versus prescriptive , arguing that these must be empirically determined and defined (ie, describing what is ) rather than prescribed according to values and morals (ie, describing what should be ). In accordance with Hume's Law (ie, an ‘ought’ cannot be derived from an ‘is’), 22 several respondents cautioned that problems of living, such as ‘poverty, vices, social injustices and stupidity’, should not be defined ‘as medical problems’. Many respondents described mental health in relation to hierarchical levels , and/or temporal trajectories , and/or context ( table 3 , figure 3 ).…”

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…This finding is similar to other issues in public health policy that address instances of ‘conflating scientific evidence with moral argument’. 15 22 Indeed, a primary criticism of the WHO definition of health is that its declaration of “complete physical, mental, and social wellbeing” 6 is prescriptive rather than descriptive. 15 Such a definition “contributes to the medicalization of society” and excludes most people, most of the time, and has little practical value “because ‘complete’ is neither operational nor measurable.” 15 …”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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What is mental health? Evidence towards a new definition from a mixed methods multidisciplinary international survey

et al. 2015

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ObjectiveLack of consensus on the definition of mental health has implications for research, policy and practice. This study aims to start an international, interdisciplinary and inclusive dialogue to answer the question: What are the core concepts of mental health?Design and participants50 people with expertise in the field of mental health from 8 countries completed an online survey. They identified the extent to which 4 current definitions were adequate and what the core concepts of mental health were. A qualitative thematic analysis was conducted of their responses. The results were validated at a consensus meeting of 58 clinicians, researchers and people with lived experience.Results46% of respondents rated the Public Health Agency of Canada (PHAC, 2006) definition as the most preferred, 30% stated that none of the 4 definitions were satisfactory and only 20% said the WHO (2001) definition was their preferred choice. The least preferred definition of mental health was the general definition of health adapted from Huber et al (2011). The core concepts of mental health were highly varied and reflected different processes people used to answer the question. These processes included the overarching perspective or point of reference of respondents (positionality), the frameworks used to describe the core concepts (paradigms, theories and models), and the way social and environmental factors were considered to act. The core concepts of mental health identified were mainly individual and functional, in that they related to the ability or capacity of a person to effectively deal with or change his/her environment. A preliminary model for the processes used to conceptualise mental health is presented.ConclusionsAnswers to the question, ‘What are the core concepts of mental health?’ are highly dependent on the empirical frame used. Understanding these empirical frames is key to developing a useful consensus definition for diverse populations.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 87%

Section: Resultsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

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What is mental health? Evidence towards a new definition from a mixed methods multidisciplinary international survey

et al. 2015

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“…8 There is also the consideration of the wider impact of use of compulsion on service users’ perception of mental health services. As Segal and Tauber 33 have argued, the ethical conflicts inherent in compulsory community treatment cannot be decided by empirical evidence alone; robust ethical debate is also necessary in deciding the future role of CTOs in mental health policy and clinical practice.…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Community treatment orders in New Zealand: regional variability and international comparisons

O’Brien

2014

Australas Psychiatry

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“…The law not only promotes medication compliance in order to alleviate risk, it also creates the conditions under which the psychiatric subject can be managed with more intrusive interventions. In keeping with the critical scholarship that suggests that the use of CTOs makes the community no less restrictive than the hospital (Heffern and Austin, 1999;Munetz and Geller, 1993;Segal and Tauber, 2007;Snow and Austin, 2009), I argue that CTOs are de facto forced medication orders.…”

Section: Conditioning Competence Through Responsibilizationmentioning

confidence: 90%

Spinning the revolving door: The governance of non-compliant psychiatric subjects on community treatment orders

Klassen

2016

Theoretical Criminology

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This article examines the enactment of community treatment orders (CTOs) in Alberta, Canada to illustrate how civil law is used to constitute and govern psychiatric patients in the community. I argue that the logic of CTOs constitutes the psychiatric patient as a fractured subject who is simultaneously capable/incapable of making medical decisions and at risk/ risky. These paradoxical characterizations highlight how depictions of rationality and choice are contingent on consenting to a pharmacological regime designed to normalize these patients. This construction functions to eliminate opportunities for rationally informed types of non-compliance and promotes hospitalization as the only way to manage harmful, risky and non-conforming individuals. I contend that CTOs are a flawed instrument of regulation that cannot manage 'legally' capable but non-compliant individuals.The desire to effectively manage people with mental disorders is not a new phenomenon in psychiatry (Foucault, 1988;Grob, 1991). With the adoption of psychotropic medication and the movement towards community mental health care, the ability of psychiatrists to

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Revisiting Hume's Law

Cited by 6 publications

References 7 publications

What is mental health? Evidence towards a new definition from a mixed methods multidisciplinary international survey

What is mental health? Evidence towards a new definition from a mixed methods multidisciplinary international survey

Community treatment orders in New Zealand: regional variability and international comparisons

Spinning the revolving door: The governance of non-compliant psychiatric subjects on community treatment orders

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