Citizen Participation in Community Mental Health

Within a review of literature about citizen participation in community mental health, the historical background of such partcipation is outlined and a number of problems with existing citizen boards discussed. A number of contributions by advisory boards to community mental health are highlighted: community control, program permanency, encouragement of primary prevention, and an impetus to community education. The value of actively involving the actual consumers of community mental health services, the clients, is also discussed related to the new concept of client advisory boards. The authors conclude that while many problems exist with citizens partcipation in community mental health, the argument in favor of citizen and client boards is too compelling to dismiss.