Making the subjects of mental health care: a cross‐cultural comparison of mental health policy in Hong Kong, China and New South Wales, Australia

Constituting ‘social problems’ in particular ways has a range of effects, including for how subjects are positioned within policy and discourse. Employing an approach grounded in poststructuralist and social constructionist thinking, this analysis interrogates how the subjects of mental health care...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Sociology of health & illness 2019-05, Vol.41 (4), p.740-754
Main Authors: Cui, Jialiang, Lancaster, Kari, Newman, Christy E.
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
comparative methods
Constructionism
Cross cultural studies
Cross-Cultural Comparison
Health care policy
Health Policy
Health problems
Hong Kong
Humans
Mental Disorders - psychology
Mental health
Mental health care
Mental health policy
Mental health services
Multiculturalism & pluralism
New South Wales
policy analysis
Policy Making
Poststructuralism
Reforms
Social problems
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Summary:Constituting ‘social problems’ in particular ways has a range of effects, including for how subjects are positioned within policy and discourse. Employing an approach grounded in poststructuralist and social constructionist thinking, this analysis interrogates how the subjects of mental health care were constituted and problematised in mental health policies in two distinctive contexts, unsettling the taken‐for granted assumptions which underpin these problematisations. Two policies were selected for analysis as exemplar pieces of mental health policy reform in Hong Kong and New South Wales (NSW). Subjects were constituted as ‘patientised’ individuals (in Hong Kong) encouraged to depend on professionals who help them reintegrate into the ‘normal’ community, and as ‘traumatised’ individuals (in NSW) expected to take responsibility to guide the delivery of mental health care and respected as a part of diversity in community settings. While both policies constituted subjects as ‘unwell individuals’ and enacted ‘dividing practices’, subjectivities were shaped by distinctive cultural and socio‐political contexts. This analysis shifts our attention away from a focus on the effectiveness of policy solutions to the heterogeneity and contingency of policy ‘problems’ and ‘subjects’, opening up new possibilities for ‘out‐of‐the‐box’ policy responses to mental health.
ISSN:0141-9889
1467-9566
DOI:10.1111/1467-9566.12851