A place to be yourself: empowerment from the client's perspective

This article describes a focused ethnography of a group of chronically mentally ill clients who were involved in a client-run drop-in center. Spradley's (1979) Developmental Research Sequence guided the research. Data were obtained from interviews, participant-observation and documents review. The qualitative analysis identified the major theme of empowerment, which had four process domains: participating, choosing, supporting and negotiating. These domains represented four levels of empowerment for this group. From the client's perspective, empowerment meant they participated more in the community, their choices were increased, they provided support for each other and they negotiated on a more equal basis with staff. A fifth domain, personal significance, described the effects of empowerment for each individual.