Compulsory Mental Health Interventions And The Crpd

This book delineates the scope of permissible compulsory mental health interventions under the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). The initial impetus for this study was provided by a conflict between two competing positions within the current debate over the future of coercive psychiatry. According to one position, defended by the CRPD Committee, among others, compulsory mental health care necessarily violates the prohibition of discrimination. According to the competing position, supported by the vast majority of states, compulsion is sometimes necessary to protect health and life and, if coupled with appropriate legal safeguards, it is lawful under such circumstances. This book disputes both positions and argues that the scope of permissible compulsory care can be identified using proportionality reasoning. Drawing on the work of Robert Alexy, it develops a framework for proportionality assessments within the context of non-discrimination. The framework can assist decision-makers to design principled and evidence-based mental health care regimes. This book thus provides a new way forward for states parties looking to reform their mental health care regimes and to improve compliance with the CRPD. It will appeal to academics and practitioners engaged in mental health reform in the post-CRPD era.

The Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) has generated new ideas and standards in healthcare and disability law and policy. In the mental health context, the CRPD directs governments to ensure people with mental impairments are treated equally before the law, including ensuring people have access to the resources necessary to enjoy their rights. But what this means in practice remains unclear. In addition, current domestic laws that authorise involuntary psychiatric interventions stand at cross-purposes with the CRPD, which requires respect for the 'will, preference and rights' of persons with disabilities 'on an equal basis with others'. This book explores the implications of the CRPD for law, policy and practice that respond to the complex issues raised by mental health impairment and disability. It argues that the support framework of the CRPD holds the potential to address persistent shortcomings in mental health law and policy.

This book comprehensively discusses the background to the passing of India's revolutionary Mental Healthcare Act, 2017, offering a detailed description of the Act itself and a rigorous analysis in the context of the CRPD and the World Health Organization (WHO) standards for mental health law. It examines the fine balance, between complying with the CRPD while still delivering practical, humane, and implementable legislation. It explores how this legislation was shaped by the WHO standards and provides insights into areas where the Indian legislators deviated from these guidelines and why. Taking India as an example, it highlights what is possible in other low- and middle-income countries. Further it covers key issues in mental health, identifying potential competing interests and exploring the difficulties and limitations of international guidelines. The book is a valuable resource for psychiatrists, nurses, social workers, non-governmental organizations and all mental healthcare workers in India and anyone studying human rights law.

Mental health law is a rapidly evolving area of practice and research, with growing global dimensions. This work reflects the increasing importance of this field, critically discussing key issues of controversy and debate, and providing up-to-date analysis of cutting-edge developments in Africa, Asia, Europe, the Americas, and Australia. This is a timely moment for this book to appear. The United Nations’ Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (2006) sought to transform the landscape in which mental health law is developed and implemented. This Convention, along with other developments, has, to varying degrees, informed sweeping legislative reforms in many countries around the world. These and other developments are discussed here. Contributors come from a wide range of countries and a variety of academic backgrounds including ethics, law, philosophy, psychiatry, and psychology. Some contributions are also informed by lived experience, whether in person or as family members. The result is a rich, polyphonic, and sometimes discordant account of what mental health law is and what it might be. The Handbook is aimed at mental health scholars and practitioners as well as students of law, human rights, disability studies, and psychiatry, and campaigners and law- and policy-makers.

This Commentary provides the first comprehensive legal article-by-article analysis of the provisions of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). The Convention is the key international human rights instrument exclusively devoted to persons with disabilities and the centerpiece of international efforts to address inequalities and barriers they encounter to the full enjoyment of human rights. The book discusses the Convention’s position within existing international human rights law and within the framework of the United Nations measures to protect the rights of people with disabilities. Starting with the background of all the Convention’s articles, including the travaux préparatoires, this Commentary examines each provision’s substance and interpretation, and explores the significance of each right, its legal scope and relationship with other international legal norms and principles. A unique contribution also analyzes the Optional Protocol to the Convention. In addition to enriching academic studies of international human rights law, the book provides insights into the practical operation of the Convention’s provisions by assessing the practice of the CRPD Committee, the activities of relevant international and regional human rights bodies in enforcing the rights of persons with disabilities and the contracting parties’ implementation practices. Relevant European Court of Human Rights, the Court of Justice of the European Union and, if appropriate, other regional jurisdictions’ case law, as well as the jurisprudence of domestic courts, are taken into consideration. Contributions from leading scholars and international experts make this book an indispensable resource for lawyers, academics, students, journalists, international organizations, NGOs and other stakeholders wanting to better understand the rights of people with disabilities. Furthermore, it makes a valuable contribution to appraising the impact of the Convention in the legal orders of contracting parties and to charting the way forward in the protection of the rights of persons with disabilities.

The adoption of the Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities (CPRD) by the United Nations in 2006 is the first comprehensive and binding treaty on the rights of people with disabilities. It establishes the right of people with disabilities to equality, dignity, autonomy, full participation, as well as the right to live in the community, and the right to supported decision-making and inclusive education. Prior to the CRPD, international law had provided only limited protections to people with disabilities. This book analyses the development of disability rights as an international human rights movement. Focusing on the United States and countries in Asia, Africa, the Middle East the book examines the status of people with disabilities under international law prior to the adoption of the CPRD, and follows the development of human rights protections through the convention’s drafting process. Arlene Kanter argues that by including both new applications and entirely new approaches to human rights treaty enforcement, the CRPD is significant not only to people with disabilities but also to the general development of international human rights, by offering new human rights protections for all people. Taking a comparative perspective, the book explores how the success of the CRPD in achieving protections depends on the extent to which individual countries enforce domestic laws and policies, and the changing public attitudes towards people with disabilities. This book will be of excellent use and interest to researchers and students of human rights law, discrimination, and disability studies.

This treatise is a detailed article-by-article examination of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD). Each article of the CRPD contains a methodical analysis of the preparatory works, followed by an exhaustive examination of the contents of each article based on case law and concluding observations from the CRPD Committee, judgments from national and international courts and tribunals, pertinent UN and other reports, the key literature on the article under review. The volume features commentary from a broad range of scholars across a variety of disciplines in order to provide a comprehensive study of the legal, psychological, education, sociological, and other aspects of the CPRD. This encyclopaedic commentary on the CRPD effectively covers all the issues arising from international disability law and practice, and will be an ideal resource for all working in the field.