Perspective of deinstitutionalization: reading keys to understand a national mental health policy aligned with the psychiatric reform

Abstract

The perspective of deinstitutionalization is understood as an organizing axis of the Brazilian mental health policy in the years of psychiatric reform. Considering the policy reformulation, it is relevant to understand this perspective for analyses regarding changes in public mental health policies perspective. A literature review was held aiming the reconstruction of the central arguments of deinstitutionalization perspective, and four reading keys were highlighted: control circuit, power exercise, keeping contradictions open, and open/closed institution. This study has shown that they are interrelated and embedded in practical field, comprising the need to: questioning the object of psychiatry, reflect on the articulation between institutional apparatuses that maintain segregation and custody of deviants; identify power relations and refuse the social mandate of workers; operate dialectically with contradictions in daily practices of substitutive services; and to sustain institution’s openness to the multiplicity of modes of expression and interaction, being critical and keeping attention to closing moments. It must be emphasized that it is by practical action that the keys are validated, constructing freedom and citizenship in real life contexts. For future reflection, mental health policy changes that imply a discontinuity of the theoreticalpractical perspective of deinstitutionalization are pointed out.