Fighting for Recovery: An Activists' History of Mental Health Reform
By Phyllis Vine (’18) | Beacon Press | September 27, 2022
“Fighting for Recovery” reveals how grassroots activists challenged medical authority and popular opinion to insist upon recovery for people managing a mental illness. Since the middle of the last century, people with a lived experience have upended conventional beliefs that deterioration was inevitable. With an abiding pursuit of choice, they opposed the use of force and built a movement with innovative service options.They focused on person-centered needs, the development of skills with respect for strengths, and situated their work within broad-based fights for equity and social justice.
Readers will meet leaders from California to Maine who campaigned for peer services, who designed non-coercive crisis programs, and who sought respite rather than institutionalization while decrying the injustice of criminalizing mental illnesses. They will discover the charisma of leaders such as Howie the Harp, Judi Chamberlin, Sally Zinman, and dozens more, who insisted on humane services while fighting for recovery.