Examining Narratives of Cultural Diversity in Mental Health Law

Abstract

There is a currently a dearth of critical legal literature available which highlights the lived experiences of ethno-racial people with mental health disabilities who interact with civil mental health laws, and are subsequently subjected to involuntary detention and forced psychiatric medication amongst other severe consequences (Dhir 2008). Indeed, their voices are silenced and their narratives appear to be “invisible” in the justice system and the broader mental health system. To address the theme of justice, visuality, and visibility, in this paper I examine the narratives and lived experiences of the courageous ethno-racial participants of the mental health system who have chosen to have their voices heard. The narratives are drawn from empirical data collected through seven intensive interviews with ethno-racial people with mental health disabilities (in-patients and ex-patients), who experienced discrimination while institutionalized in Ontario’s civil mental health system and interacting with mental health laws. In Part I and II of this paper, the empirical data is presented and examined thematically vis-à-vis their experiences with the mental health tribunal’s (Ontario Consent and Capacity Board) pre-hearing, hearing, and post-hearing processes and the broader mental health system. Within each emerging theme, participants provide recommendations to address the inequities they have experienced within the justice system. In Part III of the paper, I argue that practitioners should adopt tenets of Therapeutic Jurisprudence to ensure that ethno-racial people with mental health disabilities are provided with procedural fairness, substantive equality and therapeutic outcomes when confronted with multiple forms of discrimination in the civil mental health system.