Verdict of the Russell Tribunal on Psychiatry

As a result of the evidence it has heard in its first session in Berlin over the weekend of June 30/July 1, 2001, the Tribunal is convinced that the serious abuse of human rights in the name of psychiatry is widespread but largely unrecognized.

In accordance with the United Nations Declaration of Human Rights the majority of the jury deeply deplore the incarceration of people against their will in the name of psychiatry. The perpetration of such practices is a threat to individual and collective liberty everywhere.

We consider the concept of "mental illness" and the "medical model" of psychiatry to explain human behaviour dangerous and fallacious because it is deterministic (particularly in the case of bio-psychiatry) deprives people of choice and responsibility. It even justifies concepts such as the legal category of "mental patient" which permits a total deprivation of human and civil rights and actually is used to exculpate anti-social and criminal actions.

We deplore the action of the Free University which reneged upon its promise to host the Tribunal following pressure of its Department of Psychiatry. Nevertheless we are determined to continue our investigations and hearings and to use the media and all means of communication available to explore these abuses and to alert public opinion to the dangers to human freedom presented by the uncritical acceptance of the claims and practices of psychiatry. We think further investigation should be conducted to explore specific psychiatric abuses: forced drugging, electroshock, four point restraint and involuntary hospitalization.

Strict legal and political supervision of mental hospitals and psychiatric practices is a prerequisite for the effective protection of human rights. Legal mechanisms should include legal representation, access to relevant documents, civil or criminal liability for incarceration and prohibition of discrimination against "mental patients". Further political and public steps should be taken including critical public examination of the role of psychiatry, its scientific basis and the justifiability of contemporary psychiatric practice.

Psychiatry not only refuses to renounce the force it has historically obtained from the state, it even takes on the role of a highly paid and respected agent of social control and international police force over behaviour and the repression of political and social dissent.

We find psychiatry guilty of the combination of force and unaccountability, a classic definition of totalitarian systems. We demand the abolition of the "mental health" laws as a first step toward making psychiatry accountable to society. To this end, compensation should be made for harms it has done. Public funds should be made available for humane and dignified alternatives to coercive psychiatry.

Signed (members of the jury):

Kate Millett
Ken Fleet
Esther Hertzog
Ron Leifer
Jacob Emanuel Mabe
Wolf-Dieter Narr
Richard E. Vatz

Two jury members disagreed and wrote the following minority opinion.

Minority Opinion

As a result of the evidence we the minority members of the jury (two members) heard in the first session in Berlin over the weekend of June 30 and July 1, 2001, we are convinced that the serious abuse of human rights in the name of psychiatry is widespread, but largely unrecognized.

We the minority also deeply deplore the unjustified incarceration of people against their will in the name of psychiatry as a gross violation of human rights. We think that further investigation and hearings should be conducted to explore the abuses and alert public opinion to the dangers to human freedom presented by the uncritical acceptance of the claims and practices of psychiatry.

Further political and public steps should be taken. Those include public critical examination of the role of psychiatry, its scientific basis and the justifiability of contemporary psychiatric practices.

Signed: Paulo Coelho, Alon Harel

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