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Ideology and Insanity: Essays on the Psychiatric Dehumanization of Man
This volume contains the earliest essays, going back more than 30 years, in which the author staked out his position on 'the nature, scope, methods & values of psychiatry.'
Preface
Preface to the 1st Edition
Acknowledgments
The myth of mental illness
The mental health ethic
The rhetoric of rejection
Mental health as ideology
What psychiatry can & cannot do
Bootlegging humanistic values through psychiatry
The insanity plea & the insanity verdict
Involuntary mental hospitalization: a crime against humanity
Mental health services in the school
Psychiatry, the state & the university: the problem of the professional identity of academic psychiatry
Psychiatric classification as a strategy of personal constraint
Whither psychiatry?
Index
Preface
Preface to the 1st Edition
Acknowledgments
The myth of mental illness
The mental health ethic
The rhetoric of rejection
Mental health as ideology
What psychiatry can & cannot do
Bootlegging humanistic values through psychiatry
The insanity plea & the insanity verdict
Involuntary mental hospitalization: a crime against humanity
Mental health services in the school
Psychiatry, the state & the university: the problem of the professional identity of academic psychiatry
Psychiatric classification as a strategy of personal constraint
Whither psychiatry?
Index
278 pages, Paperback
First published January 1, 1970
About the author
Thomas Szasz
99 books329 followersThomas Stephen Szasz (pronounced /sas/; born April 15, 1920 in Budapest, Hungary) was a psychiatrist and academic. He was Professor Emeritus of Psychiatry at the State University of New York Health Science Center in Syracuse, New York. He was a prominent figure in the antipsychiatry movement, a well-known social critic of the moral and scientific foundations of psychiatry, and of the social control aims of medicine in modern society, as well as of scientism. He is well known for his books, The Myth of Mental Illness (1960) and The Manufacture of Madness: A Comparative Study of the Inquisition and the Mental Health Movement which set out some of the arguments with which he is most associated.
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Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews
January 1, 2014
Thomas Szasz defines the right of the anti-psychiatry movement as R.D. Laing defines the left...probably. A psychoanalytically trained psychiatrist and emeritus professor at SUNY, you'd think he had it made in the establishment and, financially speaking, he likely did. But still, almost everything Dr. Szasz has published has been a radical critique of psychotherapeutics, psychiatry and academic psychology. His heroes are the iconoclastic individualists, ranging from the economists von Mises and Hayek through Freud to...(and here is where the "probably" came from) the prominent socialists Wilhelm Reich and Jack London.
Although I do not subscribe to the ideal of an unfettered capitalism and find his occasional bows to such naive economic theory offputting, I believe that Szasz's regard for the likes of Reich, London and others of that ilk indicate that his primary values are in fact individual liberty and dignity, irrespective of age, race, gender, nation or any other predication. In that, we agree.
Having been trained to be a psychotherapist myself, I have found Szasz's books a vital corrective and caution to what I was taught and to how, in jobs of that sort, this was put into practice--so effective a caution that he probably contributed to my hesitation in pursuing such a career--that and the ugliness of taking money for such "work" (viz. socialistic tendencies), that is.
Szasz's attitude is best summed up in his book on Schizophrenia which I'll cover some time. Basically, he claims that psychiatric (not neurology's) nosology has the status of medieval demonology. In other words, there are no such things as schizophrenia, bipolarity, affective disorders, attention deficit disorders--not in any scientific sense, not in any way more significant than the distinctions between orders of demons. The reason for this claim is that these conditions have no known physical aetiology. Oh, they may have statistically mapable correlatives such as are revealed by various neuro-imaging techniques, but there's no known bug, no bacterium or virus or lesion which can be shown to cause them--not as, say, tertiary syphillitic psychosis or certain forms of senile dementia can be demonstrated to have a material basis. The "causes" of such syndromes as come and go from one Diagnostic & Statistical Manual edition to another are instead, so far as we know, of a social and moral nature. Psychiatry is--or ought be--a moral, not a medical science.
Although emphasizing the rights of the client/patient and the duty of the psychiatrist to them, Szasz is not unmindful of the commonweal and of the rights of society. He has no problem with incarcerating those who are real threats to others--though he rejects the wholesale employment of insanity defenses and psychiatric imprisonment. Indeed, given the fact that institutional professionals will continue to serve their masters and that government has a role in protecting the masses from some antisocial behaviors, he makes the novel suggestion in his final essay that perhaps mental health professionals ought be distinguished as lawyers are, namely, as prosecuting (institutional) and defending (client-serving) psychotherapists.
Although I do not subscribe to the ideal of an unfettered capitalism and find his occasional bows to such naive economic theory offputting, I believe that Szasz's regard for the likes of Reich, London and others of that ilk indicate that his primary values are in fact individual liberty and dignity, irrespective of age, race, gender, nation or any other predication. In that, we agree.
Having been trained to be a psychotherapist myself, I have found Szasz's books a vital corrective and caution to what I was taught and to how, in jobs of that sort, this was put into practice--so effective a caution that he probably contributed to my hesitation in pursuing such a career--that and the ugliness of taking money for such "work" (viz. socialistic tendencies), that is.
Szasz's attitude is best summed up in his book on Schizophrenia which I'll cover some time. Basically, he claims that psychiatric (not neurology's) nosology has the status of medieval demonology. In other words, there are no such things as schizophrenia, bipolarity, affective disorders, attention deficit disorders--not in any scientific sense, not in any way more significant than the distinctions between orders of demons. The reason for this claim is that these conditions have no known physical aetiology. Oh, they may have statistically mapable correlatives such as are revealed by various neuro-imaging techniques, but there's no known bug, no bacterium or virus or lesion which can be shown to cause them--not as, say, tertiary syphillitic psychosis or certain forms of senile dementia can be demonstrated to have a material basis. The "causes" of such syndromes as come and go from one Diagnostic & Statistical Manual edition to another are instead, so far as we know, of a social and moral nature. Psychiatry is--or ought be--a moral, not a medical science.
Although emphasizing the rights of the client/patient and the duty of the psychiatrist to them, Szasz is not unmindful of the commonweal and of the rights of society. He has no problem with incarcerating those who are real threats to others--though he rejects the wholesale employment of insanity defenses and psychiatric imprisonment. Indeed, given the fact that institutional professionals will continue to serve their masters and that government has a role in protecting the masses from some antisocial behaviors, he makes the novel suggestion in his final essay that perhaps mental health professionals ought be distinguished as lawyers are, namely, as prosecuting (institutional) and defending (client-serving) psychotherapists.
December 14, 2023
I struggle to comprehend that this book was publushed over 50 years ago. Szasz has managed to predict what would come of psychiatry pretty accurately. It is quite chilling.
Szasz utilises very clever language throughout his essays, which is something that I am extremely appreciative of. Szasz's utilises many interesting analogies, as well as a sophisticated use of language in order to get his point across and make an argument. With that being said, Szasz's arguments remain simple to comprehend, and serve as food for thought. One does not need prior knowledge or preparation in order to read this book, as it is very straightforward and easy to comprehend.
Szasz was so ahead of his time. I really enjoy Szasz's witty style of writing, and his willingness to scrutinise psychiatry. So bold, so clever. I am in awe.
Szasz utilises very clever language throughout his essays, which is something that I am extremely appreciative of. Szasz's utilises many interesting analogies, as well as a sophisticated use of language in order to get his point across and make an argument. With that being said, Szasz's arguments remain simple to comprehend, and serve as food for thought. One does not need prior knowledge or preparation in order to read this book, as it is very straightforward and easy to comprehend.
Szasz was so ahead of his time. I really enjoy Szasz's witty style of writing, and his willingness to scrutinise psychiatry. So bold, so clever. I am in awe.
March 15, 2022
se nota un poco a veces que szasz es liberal (mucho en el último capítulo) pero dice cosas bastante chulas e interesantes se me recomendó como introducción a la antipsiquiatria y al ser una recopilación de varios ensayos cortos toca varios temas asi que cumple
February 9, 2022
An interesting read; he makes good points, though politically I think he oversimplifies things a bit much. Let's just say mental illness isn't straightforward, and there is not a strict divide between the individual and the community, as Szaz imagines.
August 7, 2026
When you read a book that is nearly 60 years old about a subject that has changed greatly over those past 60 years you do get to see what leaders in the field we’re saying long ago.
Szasz’s argument is that there is no such thing as mental illness. You can’t catch it. You can’t transmit it. It is a metaphor that comes to us from the late Middle Ages and it is inadequate today. When he says that mental illness is a myth, he does not mean that people do not have problems in their lives and do not behave oddly sometimes.
By oddly, he means outside current established social norms. That is the key to his argument. When we accuse anyone of mental illness we are always comparing it to other behaviors that we see around us.
Chapter 2 looks at the development of something called community psychiatry, whereby psychiatrists become administrators and the goal is “the prevention treatment and rehabilitation of the mentally ill”, and “the mentally retarded are to be considered a community responsibility and not a private problem to be dealt with by individuals and their families in consultation with their medical advisors.”
Thomas Szasz is working in the same field or territory as Michele Foucault although he is not as upfront about the nature of the power grab
of the psychiatric professional. And of course, he is not willing to throw out the baby with the bathwater so he is not a relativist like Michele Foucault.
The ideologies referred to in the title that he is mostly concerned with our individualism and collectivism.
Szasz spends no time really discussing what we would call unusual behavior or its potential or origins.
Szasz spends a lot of time on the medieval notion of good and evil as compared to the modern notion of mental health and mental illness.
I don’t think that mental illness amounts to a label for people who behave outside societal norms. I think it also has to do with whether or not the behavior the person engages in has anything at all to do with the goals that they have. They might dress as a woman thinking that that will make them happy. Or nowadays go through various invasive treatments to achieve the same goals.
The behavior of a young artist might be a strategy to get more attention from their parent, and also assistance in doing the things that they at the time should be able to do themselves.
I do think that those who have been treated by psychiatrists and who are taking medicines for their affliction do have the ability to turn it on and off at times, essentially to use it as a threat.
He spends chapter 10 looking at the growth of therapy and the presence of psychotherapists in schools around the country. And again he is concerned with the label that is placed on difficult children which will stay with them for the rest of their lives. He is also concerned with the change in focus and direction of the school in the presence of psychiatric services: “I shall try to show that psychiatric services in the school promote the aims of socialization and retard the aims of critical education.”
After all, “there is no child behavior that a psychiatrist could not place in one of these categories, thus classifying the child as requiring psychiatric attention.”
But the psychiatrist is in a bizarre or conflicted position. On the one hand his salary comes from the government or the state, and their objective is students who behave or are quiescent and on the other hand his stated objective is to help the child with their difficulties.
In chapter 12 he spends a great deal of time on the consequences of classifying someone in society as a depressive as insane or the like. He argues that classification turns the patient into an object. The patient is no longer human.
If we are going to read Michel Foucault on madness, then we should also read Szasz.
Szasz’s argument is that there is no such thing as mental illness. You can’t catch it. You can’t transmit it. It is a metaphor that comes to us from the late Middle Ages and it is inadequate today. When he says that mental illness is a myth, he does not mean that people do not have problems in their lives and do not behave oddly sometimes.
By oddly, he means outside current established social norms. That is the key to his argument. When we accuse anyone of mental illness we are always comparing it to other behaviors that we see around us.
Chapter 2 looks at the development of something called community psychiatry, whereby psychiatrists become administrators and the goal is “the prevention treatment and rehabilitation of the mentally ill”, and “the mentally retarded are to be considered a community responsibility and not a private problem to be dealt with by individuals and their families in consultation with their medical advisors.”
Thomas Szasz is working in the same field or territory as Michele Foucault although he is not as upfront about the nature of the power grab
of the psychiatric professional. And of course, he is not willing to throw out the baby with the bathwater so he is not a relativist like Michele Foucault.
The ideologies referred to in the title that he is mostly concerned with our individualism and collectivism.
Szasz spends no time really discussing what we would call unusual behavior or its potential or origins.
Szasz spends a lot of time on the medieval notion of good and evil as compared to the modern notion of mental health and mental illness.
I don’t think that mental illness amounts to a label for people who behave outside societal norms. I think it also has to do with whether or not the behavior the person engages in has anything at all to do with the goals that they have. They might dress as a woman thinking that that will make them happy. Or nowadays go through various invasive treatments to achieve the same goals.
The behavior of a young artist might be a strategy to get more attention from their parent, and also assistance in doing the things that they at the time should be able to do themselves.
I do think that those who have been treated by psychiatrists and who are taking medicines for their affliction do have the ability to turn it on and off at times, essentially to use it as a threat.
He spends chapter 10 looking at the growth of therapy and the presence of psychotherapists in schools around the country. And again he is concerned with the label that is placed on difficult children which will stay with them for the rest of their lives. He is also concerned with the change in focus and direction of the school in the presence of psychiatric services: “I shall try to show that psychiatric services in the school promote the aims of socialization and retard the aims of critical education.”
After all, “there is no child behavior that a psychiatrist could not place in one of these categories, thus classifying the child as requiring psychiatric attention.”
But the psychiatrist is in a bizarre or conflicted position. On the one hand his salary comes from the government or the state, and their objective is students who behave or are quiescent and on the other hand his stated objective is to help the child with their difficulties.
In chapter 12 he spends a great deal of time on the consequences of classifying someone in society as a depressive as insane or the like. He argues that classification turns the patient into an object. The patient is no longer human.
If we are going to read Michel Foucault on madness, then we should also read Szasz.
March 7, 2008
A concept with some validity, carried to the point of absurdity; the author takes the concept that societal standards sometimes determine whether people and their conduct are deemed sane or crazy, and pushes it to the point of arguing that because this is subjective, there is objectively no such thing as insanity, and any diagnosis of mental illness amounts to an act of oppression of the individual by the mob. Of course, there are situations in which people are truly, unquestionably, objectively delusional. Thomas Szasz needs to take some basic coursework in logic, because he's written a book-length faulty syllogism.
March 30, 2019
Interesting analysis of how the practice of psychiatry ought to be regulated, and the inconsistencies in the current framework, alongside other areas of medicine. It's a very rights-based, patient-autonomy based approach, as greatly opposed to the paternalistic, welfare-based approach in current UK legislation, and worldwide.
January 31, 2026
Very thought provoking, I think anyone thinking of working in MH should read it. Mainly focused on involuntary commitment and the intentions of psychiatrists (how funding impacts their ability to work on behalf of the patient/working as an arm of the government or society at large). It’s US centric and from the 60s so obviously a lot has changed since then but very interesting.
December 4, 2023
The content of this book is obsolete without a clear idea of what the US psychiatric context was like in the 1960s.
But even with it well in mind, it reads like a collection of delusions by a conspiracy theorist, or at least by someone who doesn't really know how human psychology works
But even with it well in mind, it reads like a collection of delusions by a conspiracy theorist, or at least by someone who doesn't really know how human psychology works
September 30, 2023
Obra de gran valor histórico.
Inauguró muchas escuelas y tendencias de debate dentro del campo de la salud mental. Parte de sus reflexiones siguen siendo muy válidas.
Inauguró muchas escuelas y tendencias de debate dentro del campo de la salud mental. Parte de sus reflexiones siguen siendo muy válidas.
Displaying 1 - 12 of 12 reviews