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  • Chapter 8 - Mental Health Law: ‘Legalism’ and ‘Medicalism’ – ‘Old’ and ‘New’

  • from Part II - The Cogwheels of Change
  • Edited by George Ikkos, Nick Bouras, King's College London
  • Book:
    Mind, State and Society
    Published online:
    17 June 2021
    Print publication:
    24 June 2021, pp 69-83
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  • Summary

    Changes in mental health law in England and Wales between 1959 and 2010 are reviewed – from the earlier Lunacy Act (1890) and Mental Treatment Act (1930) to the Mental Health Act (1959), Mental Health Act (1983) and the Mental Health Act (2007) amending the 1983 Act. The implications of early twenty-first-century developments – ‘decision-making capacity’–based law (including a ‘Fusion Law’) and the influence of the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2006) are discussed. The social, economic, ideological, clinical and legal contexts for changes in the law are examined. These include the paradigmatic shift from the ‘legalism’ of the Lunacy Act to the ‘medicalism’ of the 1959 Mental Health Act and, later, less dramatic shifts, to the ‘new legalism’ of the 1983 Act and then the ‘new medicalism’ of the 2007 Act. The departures from the English model in Scotland in 2003 and later in Northern Ireland are briefly considered.