The Consumer Self-Help Movement
Consumer/survivor/ex-patient (hereafter referred to collectively as
consumers) organizations were, in the main, developed in response to mental health
clients' overwhelmingly negative experiences with both the traditional mental health
system and society as a whole (Beers, 1970; Chamberlain, 1978; Zinman, Harp and Budd,
1987). Deegan (1992) refers to this common set of dehumanizing experiences as "the
Cycle of Disempowerment and Despair"; a self-fulfilling prophecy in which people are
forced ever downward, spiraling from loss of control to learned helplessness to total
surrender back to an even greater loss of control. Chamberlain (1978) equates the consumer
movement to a liberation struggle against "mentalism" and Zinman (1987)
describes it as a fight for autonomy.
It should come as no surprise then that consumer run programs must
confront both individual and systemic issues of empowerment, independence, choice,
responsibility and dignity (Van Tosh and del Vecchio, In Press).
According to Chamberlain, Rogers and Ellison's 10 member consumer
research advisory board (1996), the ideal consumer self-help program should: (1) be a
local and grass roots group; (2) control its own finances, staff and governing body; (3)
utilize a member developed vision and mission; (4) voluntary membership and participation;
(5) be flexible in programming; (6) be open to past or present mental health consumers as
well as those who see themselves as "at risk;" (7) be participatory in style;
and, (8) utilize a "people-to-people, non-clinical approach" (See also Zinman,
1987).
Zinman suggested back in 1987 that consumer self-help took many
different shapes and forms, including support groups, independent living programs,
drop-in/advocacy/independent living service centers, political action groups, client run
housing, self-supporting businesses and theater groups.
Due to unprecedented growth over the past decade, though, self-help
groups have ripened into formal peer-run agencies (Harp and Zinman, 1994). In order to
adequately fund this expansion, consumer-operated programs have adopted more traditional
governing and administrative structures (Harp and Zinman, 1994), and now provide a
sweeping array of traditional and nontraditional services, including homelessness
outreach, case management, crisis response, benefits acquisition, anti-stigma campaigns,
to research, technical assistance, employment and managed care platforms (Van Tosh and del
Vecchio, In Press).
