The future of child psychiatry. Mandate for change

It seems that the future of child psychiatry is uncertain, since its present body of knowledge and its identity both within its own discipline and relative to others are unclear. Nevertheless, the vast problems of childhood and adolescence delineated by the recent plethora of reports indicate the unmet needs, and it is obviously necessary that child psychiatrists should join other groups in attempting to radically alleviate these problems. But although it has been fashionable to describe the radical child psychiatrist as liberal, flexible, non-committed and open, true radicalism in chid psychiatry would be signalled by a return to structure, by careful and circumscribed clinical activity and by a proper measure of humility.