Larry Davidson, Jaak Rakfeldt, & John Strauss, The Roots of the Recovery Movement in Psychiatry: Lessons Learned
Abstract
TPSsptpsTranscult PsychiatryTranscultural Psychiatry1363-46151461-7471SAGE PublicationsSage UK: London, England10.1177/136346151140961910.1177_1363461511409619Book ReviewsLarry Davidson, Jaak Rakfeldt, & John Strauss, The Roots of the Recovery Movement in Psychiatry: Lessons Learned92011484503505© The Author(s) 2011 Reprints and permissions: sagepub.co.uk/journalsPermissions.nav2011McGill UniversityLarry Davidson, Jaak Rakfeldt, & John Strauss, The Roots of the Recovery Movement in Psychiatry: Lessons Learned. UK: Wiley-Blackwell, 2010. 294 pp. ISBN 9780470777633.Reviewed by: Rob Whitley, McGill University, CanadaThe concept of “recovery” has been embraced with an almost religious fervour by many stakeholders within mental health. This includes patients, practitioners, policy-makers and researchers. National and regional governments have mandated that mental health services become more recovery oriented. Patient advocacy groups have demanded a greater focus on recovery. All this is fuelled by an international research program producing theory and knowledge about facilitators and impediments to recovery.But the current focus on recovery begs many questions. One of the most important is: just what is recovery? And how different is the current focus on recovery from previous holistic approaches to healing amongst people with severe mental illness? In their new book, Davidson and colleagues attempt to answer these questions, tracing the history of the recovery movement in psychiatry from Pinel to the present day. Through this process, the