PROGRAMA DE CREACIÓN DE EMPRESAS DE BASE TECNOLÓGICA.

Another set of discourses relevant to the present study are those concerning mental illness. Policing the mentally ill operates at the nexus between, at a very minimum, discourses concerning both policing and the mentally ill.

The concept of ‘madness’ was introduced in the 15th century as an emerging fear and threat to society (Parker, Georgaca, Harper, McLaughlin, & Stowell-Smith, 1995). Madness was a lurking danger, potentially hidden within any individual and capable of being

released and unleashed upon the ‘good’ subjects of society. ‘Houses of correction’ were established in late 16th century England to contain and confine those who were mad – a matter for the police – but over time, with the emergent understandings of ‘society’ and ‘government’, ‘madness’ also became a concern for the community. Institutions were

Methodology and Method 79 established to abstract ‘madness’ from social deviancy in general, which enabled a more

concentrated exploration and intervention of mental illness : how it was understood, how it was positioned within society, and ultimately how it was treated and controlled (Parker et al., 1995).

Foucault (2003) discussed, through a collection of lectures, historical discourses of abnormality: how discursive practices created certain subject positions in which an individual can occupy and what those positions enabled or constrained. As noted earlier, discourses of a ‘norm’, a standard of human behaviour to which either people ‘achieve’ or ‘fail’, were adopted in order to correct, modify and control the population. In the 18th century, with the focus shifting towards the individual, systems and processes were constructed wherein the character and conduct of the individual became open to intervention, regulation and control, enabling a more comprehensive and thorough enacting of power upon the individual than under sovereign-led power mechanisms. Alongside the system of policing to regulate public health and protection, psychiatry emerged as a dominant meaning making system that could confront and attempt to ‘solve’ the dilemma of the disordered and therefore dangerous subjects (N. Rose, 1996).

Previously, mental ‘disorder’ had been constructed as something that was separate to the human condition. The mad were not the same as ‘us’, they were monsters, animals, completely different from the rest of society. Towards the end of the 19th century the concept of instinct emerged, transforming the notion of ‘monster’ into the understanding that any person had the capacity to possess ‘monster-like’ capabilities or instincts. A discourse of abnormality was introduced wherein psychiatry had an important role to play

80 Methodology and method as a science that could discuss, define and perhaps correct the ‘little monster’ that

potentially lurked in any of us threatening to infect others in the population if not treated with caution and intervention (Parker et al., 1995). Discursive understandings of madness as something external to the concept of humanity (that we were either human or ‘mad’) were discarded in favour of discourses that concerned moral issues regarding the humane treatment of the insane.

Through returning the humanity to the construction of those previously considered animal-like, the concerns, weaknesses and problems of ‘madness’ were transferred from outside the human condition to inside the individual. Because the responsibility for insanity lay within the individual, logic follows that so did the cure. Although the insane were returned to a position within society, through internalising the problem and responsibility of ‘madness’ society in general was relieved of the responsibility for the problem.

Responsibility for cure was instead given to the conscience of the insane. No longer would state-run facilities be held accountable for the regulation and control of madness - it was now the domain of the subject to correct their own abnormal behaviour (Parker et al., 1995).

Furthermore, madness became a crucial concern for society as in returning insanity back to the community, the strength and resources of the state were threatened (Parker et al., 1995). This ‘threat’ opened the door for psychological discourses to hold a dominant position in the maintenance and protection of society because the science of psychology was in a position to address such threat. Psychological discourses enabled discussions of a ‘norm’ from which to measure others, producing subject positions of power or

Methodology and Method 81 powerlessness, and enabled discussions concerning the conduct of the individual to

facilitate this placement. They made possible the identification, and therefore intervention, of the danger of ‘madness’ and set up positions of normality and abnormality to adopt alongside the responsibilities and consequences of such positions (Foucault, 2003). These discourses also exponentially increased the ability for surveillance and control of the state upon individuals by pushing the boundaries of investigation deeper within the individual, into their family history, their upbringing, their experiences, their thoughts and feelings and their conduct in order to identify and address the moral and social threat of madness (N. Rose, 1996). Here again we see the personal and political combining in a parallel fashion to discourses concerning policing and governance. The act of regulation and control is

combined, and therefore extended and strengthened, with the desire of the individual to obtain ‘normalcy’ (Parker et al., 1995).

This history is important to reflect upon as it traces the emergence of discourses concerning regulation, governance, ‘policing’ and mental illness which have informed present day discursive practices and the ways in which we can understand ‘policing the mentally ill’. The question Hook (2007) encourages us to explore is ‘how’ rather than ‘why’: How have such discourses come to represent the dominant ways in which police

understand their interactions with the mentally ill? How have they created certain subject positions? How have they enabled or constrained what has been possible to know and do? By examining present day systems of meaning and tracing them back to historical

discursive understandings, a picture emerges of the processes and consequences of particular discourses. The aim of this process is not to ‘discover’ new forms of knowledge, but to open up discussion and critique of the dominant forms of understanding policing the mentally ill, while at the same time strengthening discourses that may have been subverted

82 Methodology and method or subjugated through power relations of dominance and suppression and can offer

resistance to the taken-for-granted forms of ‘knowledge’ that police operate under daily.

Discourses for both policing and mental illness followed similar trajectories, working parallel with one another in response to the dominant concerns and events throughout different historical periods. Although the domains of police and psychology may be considered separate and discrete, police officers occupy a position in which they are influenced by and produce systems of meaning that combine these two domains when policing the mentally ill. Furthermore, with the advent of the deinstitutionalisation movement such clashes of discourse are bound to be increasingly combined, contrasted and amalgamated due to the increasing intimacy between the interface of police officers and the mentally ill population. How do these two sets of discourses combine to create a system of meaning concerning policing the mentally ill? How does the genealogy of those discourses produce the ways in which we can understand and discuss these concepts and how do they limit what can be said? With the recent historical change of

deinstitutionalisation are there new discourses emerging? How does that affect the relationship between mental health agencies and law enforcement? How do police make sense of their experiences of ‘policing the mentally ill’?