Inclusion as Assimilation, Integration, or Co-optation? A Post-Structural Analysis of Inclusion as Produced Through Mental Health Research on Peer Support

Datos Bibliográficos

ID4661043
AutoresAimee Sinclair (0000-0002-1745-2041, Curtin University, autor de correspondencia), Sue Gillieatt (0000-0002-6379-929X, Curtin University), Christina Fernandes (0000-0001-8816-9334, Curtin University), Lyn Mahboub (0000-0002-6582-0005, Curtin University)
Año2023
Volumen33
Número6
Páginas543-555
Fecha de publicación2023-05-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaQualitative Health Research (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 1049-7323 • E-ISSN: 1552-7557
EditorialSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/10497323231163735
PMID36938673
OpenAlexW4327901953
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas6
Referencias citadas84

In the last 20 years, research on the inclusion of peer support within mental health settings has burgeoned, paralleling the broad adoption of service user inclusion within policy as a moral imperative and universally beneficial. Despite the seemingly progressive impetus behind inclusion, increasingly peer support workers talk of exhaustion working within mental health systems, the slow rate of change to oppressive values and practices, and ongoing experiences of workplace exclusion. Such experiences suggest differences in the way in which inclusion is produced across different stakeholder groups and contexts. In this article, we adopt Bacchi's 'what's the problem represented to be?' approach to identify how mental health research, often understood as an a-political activity, produces versions of inclusion. We argue current research predominantly produces inclusion as 'assimilation' and 'integration'. We use critical inclusion, mental health, and survivor scholarship to evaluate the effects these productions have for peer support and peer support workers, finding that both problematise peer support workers and those seeking support. We consider possibilities for more liberatory productions of inclusion, building on the notion of inclusion as 'co-optation'. Our analysis points to the need for researchers to engage with an uncomfortable reflexivity to enable more emancipatory possibilities regarding inclusion and peer support

Inclusion–exclusion principle · Mental health · Peer support · Political science · Politics · Psychiatry · Public relations · Scholarship · Sociology · Stakeholder · Healthcare innovation and challenges · Mental Health and Patient Involvement · Psychology · Social Psychology · Social Work Education and Practice