Book ID: CBB322875473

Mad by the Millions: Mental Disorders and the Early Years of the World Health Organization (2021)

unapi

The World Health Organization's post–World War II work on the epidemiology and classification of mental disorders and its vision of a “world psyche.” In 1948, the World Health Organization began to prepare its social psychiatry project, which aimed to discover the epidemiology and arrive at a classification of mental disorders. In Mad by the Millions, Harry Y-Jui Wu examines the WHO's ambitious project, arguing that it was shaped by the postwar faith in technology and expertise and the universalizing vision of a “world psyche.” Wu shows that the WHO's idealized scientific internationalism laid the foundations for today's highly metricalized global mental health system. Examining the interactions between the WHO and developing countries, Wu offers an analysis of the “transnationality” of mental health. He examines knowledge-sharing between the organization and African and Latin American collaborators, and looks in detail at the WHO's selection of a Taiwanese scientist, Tsung-yi Lin, to be its medical officer and head of the social psychiatry project. He discusses scientists' pursuit of standardization—not only to synchronize sectors in the organization but also to produce a common language of psychiatry—and how technological advances supported this. Wu considers why the optimism and idealism of the social psychiatry project turned to dissatisfaction, reappraising the WHO's early knowledge production modality through the concept of an “export processing zone.” Finally, he looks at the WHO's project in light of current debates over psychiatry and global mental health, as scientists shift their concerns from the creation of universal metrics to the importance of local matrixes.

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Reviewed By

Review James Flowers (2023) Review of "Mad by the Millions: Mental Disorders and the Early Years of the World Health Organization". Journal of the History of Medicine and Allied Sciences (pp. 221-223). unapi

Review Howard Chiang (2023) Review of "Mad by the Millions: Mental Disorders and the Early Years of the World Health Organization". Journal of the History of the Behavioral Sciences (pp. 98-100). unapi

Review Nancy Tomes (2022) Review of "Mad by the Millions: Mental Disorders and the Early Years of the World Health Organization". Isis: International Review Devoted to the History of Science and Its Cultural Influences (pp. 681-682). unapi

Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB322875473/

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Authors & Contributors
Montgomery, Sarah Fawn
Balz, Viola
Dyck, Erika
Harrington, Anne
Huneman, Philippe
Jay, Mike
Journals
Mefisto: Rivista di medicina, filosofia, storia
History of Psychiatry
History of the Human Sciences
Medical History
Medizinhistorisches Journal
Science in Context
Publishers
University of Toronto
Belknap Press of Harvard University Press
Palgrave Macmillan
Polity Press
Springer
Thames & Hudson
Concepts
Psychiatry
Mental disorders and diseases
Public health
Standards and standardization
Medicine and society
Pharmacy
Time Periods
20th century
21st century
19th century
20th century, late
18th century
Places
Italy
United States
Africa
Great Britain
Europe
Germany
Institutions
World Health Organization (WHO)
American Psychiatric Association
Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM)
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