Describing the history of developing solidarity among diverse people – a global grassroots movement of people with psychosocial disabilities

I have been conducting a study of a global grassroots movement of people with psychosocial disabilities. People with psychosocial disabilities around the world are placed in extremely different circumstances, and sometimes hold opposing views. How have people managed to form a global organization and work together in spite of these differences? This question has been the focus of my research. To answer it, I have gathered oral histories and written materials to document the history of this organization. As a result of this work, I have found that not having one’s experiences and views properly accepted is something people with psychosocial disabilities around the world have in common. I also found approaches to solidarity that differed from those studied in previous research, such as changing the name of the organization to make it clear that people belonging to it hold opposing views and a membership agreement designed to allow people who oppose each other within their own country to achieve solidarity as a global organization. I presented the results of this research as my doctoral thesis, a revised version of which was published as a book in August of 2021.

In this book I placed as much importance on detailed descriptions of events related to the movement as I did on
deriving questions from previous research, and verification undertaken to reach conclusions. This account was based on interviews and written materials such as newsletters and meeting minutes concerning one organization and fourteen activists. While details such as the international phonecall service selected and the scenery of the areas where the meetings were held will presumably have little effect on the conclusions I reach, I nevertheless made an effort to confirm the relevance of each record, organize them in a timeline, and preserve this account in writing.

Most historical accounts concerning psychosocial disabilities have focused not on the people with these disabilities themselves but rather on the “progress” of theory and practice made by psychiatric professionals involved in the treatment and management of illnesses and disabilities. In this history people with psychosocial disabilities have been seen as passive subjects of study. In recent years, the perspective of these people themselves has come to be seen as important, but the study of activities of people with psychosocial disabilities has mainly targeted self-help activities as useful means of treatment or social adaptation. In the context of this kind of research bias, clearly describing the history of a global organization of people with psychosocial disabilities offers proof that people engaging in important dissent against society indeed exist and have come together in solidarity.

However, the area of my study thus far has been biased toward Western Europe. As a result, people from Asia, Africa, and Central and South America who have participated in the global organization’s activities in the roughly ten years since its formation have been portrayed as having been passively mobilized. Believing that this may not be the case, I began to study these regions.

For the fieldtrips that formed the basis of this book, I crossed borders close to ten times in the period of around a
month in each of 2018 and 2019 to meet with activists in person. While listening to their stories in interviews and reading the documents I had gathered after returning to Japan, I vividly remember being troubled by unreconcilable contradictions, feeling frustration at intractable circumstances, and having the urge to cheer at good results. Around the time the book was published, it suddenly became very difficult to carry out such research. The spread of the COVID-19 pandemic limited overseas travel, and Russia’s invasion of Ukraine led to extreme tensions in international relations. Precisely because of such factors, however, I think the necessity and importance of continuing such research has increased. In order to consider the future of the solidarity of diverse people, going forward I will continue to record and methodically study the history of this movement of people with psychosocial disabilities that has managed to engage in activities on a global scale despite many obstacles.

Itō Kasumi (Post-Doctoral Research Fellow, Japan Society for the Promotion of Science)