The manufacture of madness: A comparative study of the inquisition and the mental health movement [Paperback]

Thomas Stephen Szasz (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: 1977

In this seminal work, Dr. Szasz examines the similarities between the Inquisition and institutional psychiatry. His purpose is to show "that the belief in mental illness and the social actions to which it leads have the same moral implications and political consequences as had the belief in witchcraft and the social actions to which it led."

--This text refers to an alternate Paperback edition.

Product Details

• Paperback: 383 pages
• Publisher: Harper & Row (1977)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0060905603
• ISBN-13: 978-0060905606
• Product Dimensions: 7.7 x 5.2 x 1.1 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (10 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #2,430,132 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

45 of 47 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Attacking the Disease Model, September 4, 2000

By 

Rob Lightner - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Manufacture of Madness: A Comparative Study of the Inquisition and the Mental Health Movement (Paperback)

The Manufacture of Madness is a fine historical analysis of psychiatry and the mental health movement, drawing comparisons between the medical establishment's treatment of deviants as mental patients and the Inquisition's treatment of deviants as witches. Radical, perhaps, although it must have seemed much more radical in 1970, when first published. Dr. Szasz knew his material well, having worked for twenty years as a psychiatrist in this country prior to writing the book.

His views were considered heretical by his colleagues (an irony that he makes much of) because he argued, quite strongly, that institutional psychiatry is dehumanizing both to patients and society as a whole because it deprives these people of all rights, treats them as objects to be repaired, and submits them to cruel tortures in the name of therapy. He went on to declare that mental illness itself is a myth; there has never been a scientific basis for treating social and behavioral deviance as stemming from the same causes as physical illnesses, nor reason to try to cure it. His central thesis is that institutional psychiatry fills the same role in modern times as the Inquisition did until only a few hundred years ago--a system of control and suppression of social deviants.

39 of 43 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars A Totally Surprising and Amazing Book, July 5, 2004

By 

Harry Littell (Sacramento, CA USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: The Manufacture of Madness: A Comparative Study of the Inquisition and the Mental Health Movement (Paperback)

I first came across this book about 15 years ago while going through some stacks in the library of a community college in San Bruno CA. What stunned me at first was the equation of modern psychiatry being the child (i.e. direct decendant) of the Inquisition. I made a copy of the book but misplaced it. Even so, I thought about the little bit I read of it for years. It never left my mind.

Then the issue of manufacturing a person's madness came intimately into my life during the past two years or so. I found a used copy (maybe Amazon.com) and read it within the past three months. This book literally armed me with arguments that permitted me to persuade others--those holding the keys of bondage--that their system was flawed, and it resulted in the release of a person from incarceration in a mental institution. Since that time this person has been seen by a number of mental health professionals none of which attach a mental diagnosis to him.

I think the true value of this book to me is the psychoanalytic quality of the writing and its systematic approach. I would see it as being very hard to find Szasz's arguments as flawed, although I can see how some aspects of his thought maybe viewed as being exaggerated. Still, sometimes we all have to exaggerate a problem in order to expand it be able to sufficiently see what is actually going on. I think he does this eloquently and elegantly.

There were times when I was reading the book when I thought I might not get any more out of it, and I was tempted to set it aside, and I am so glad that I didn't. I feel now that this text was a very personal thing to him, and it comes out in the end, although it might not be completely evident.

I got a great deal out of reading this book. I would recommend it to anybody whose life has been affected by fear, doubt, superstition, dogmatic therapists, etc. Just knowing how the system is set up institutionally can assist one in making better choices and articulating your views, particularly when they are based on sensitive feelings.

Many mental health professionals like to come across at times as being god-like, but those who do come across this way are often insecure and exploit others to hide their own deficiencies. This book truly helps in being able to uncover that deception in a way that you can go nose to nose with the inquisitors of this generation who can be very dangerous and who can create a tremendous amount of damage.

It is scary, but it is far more scary without the knowledge Szasz has so generoously provided us, and which is made even more poignant given the persecutions he received from others within his own field.

26 of 28 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Scholarly but in a amusing and well written manner., April 18, 1999

By 

The International Rubber Chicken Society (thi... - See all my reviews

This review is from: The Manufacture of Madness: A Comparative Study of the Inquisition and the Mental Health Movement (Paperback)

Szasz's work is extremely important and its important that anyone who comes across his work reads it. We still have very unenlightened perspectives on such everyday terms as "insanity" and "crazy". Szasz insightfully explains how insanity is a value judgement, similar to "good" and "bad". Szasz writes his ideas not only well, but in a human voice and in a humorous way at times. Included is a chapter about Masturbatory Insanity, which is well worth the purchase of this book. The comparison between the Inquistion and the abstract institution called "psychiatry" is a playful and humorous one (its SO extreme that it is extremely funny). Szasz argues this quite well too, taking the extreme comparison seriously and revealing the frightening similarities that evoke anger and unrest in the reader. The book will open your mind to much.