[International overview of psychiatric reform]

There has been an increased incidence of mental health problems around the world while psychiatry is experiencing a crisis that concerns its own identity and the definition of the scope of its work. After more than half a century of deinstitutionalized community policies, neoliberal globalization is leading to changes that undermine public attention on mental health, particularly of the disorders that require greater social attention. There have been changes in the responsibility of the state and changes in the type of demand and in the way of understanding disease and its treatment. At the time, compared to the medicalization of society that mediates the expression of needs in health, user movements are beginning to emerge demanding autonomy, full citizenship, empowerment, recovery and advocacy.