Social Representations, Knowledge and Practices of Deinstitutionalizing Insanity. Argentina, Brazil and France

This paper proposes a dialogue among specialists from Argentina, Brazil and France, in order to address the different ways of generating knowledge regarding the deinstitutionalization of the mental health care system. Each author’s theme specificity responds to the temporariness of local reforms as a fight for a social representation of the insanity as suffering, different of the biomedical mental sickness. From that point on, the knowledge interplay materializes into heterogeneous modalities in light of the psychosocial representation paradigm: (a) implications of research on the transformation of the mental health field: experiences and representations in Argentina; (b) social representation of insanity and the deinstitutionalization practices in Brazil; (c) recognition of the ‘patients’ expertise: changes in the social representation of insanity, in France.