Illuminating the invisible voices in mental health policymaking

Abstract

In public mental health policymaking, the inclusion of numerous stakeholders across lay and professional communities is expected. How the voices of these stakeholders meld to create a single unifying accounting of their actions and recommendations for policy is often unexpected. Unexpected in that, while all voices are important and participation often mandated, what is incorporated into the formal accounting of the policymaking process often does not reflect the elements of services that work most successfully for persons with mental illnesses and their family members. In this paper, I show how existing agendae of members of public policy task forces recontextualize the stories of persons with mental illnesses and their family members to reify societal expectations of these stories. I offer suggestions on how these stories should be incorporated into task force reports to further the development of appropriate policy and services that meet the needs and expectations of persons with mental illnesses and their family members.