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Mental & Social Diagnosis and the English Prison Commission 1914–1939
Author(s) -
Forsythe Bill
Publication year - 1990
Publication title -
social policy and administration
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.972
H-Index - 63
eISSN - 1467-9515
pISSN - 0144-5596
DOI - 10.1111/j.1467-9515.1990.tb00342.x
Subject(s) - commission , prison , optimism , eugenics , imprisonment , law , solitary confinement , criminology , mental illness , sociology , medicine , psychiatry , political science , psychology , mental health , social psychology
In this article the author argues that there was a strengthening optimism about the value of psychological treatment between 1914 and 1939 amongst medical personnel employed by the English Prison Commission. This optimism contrasted with the pessimistic eugenic notion that there was an increasing and unreformable underclass which transmitted its inferior mental and physical characteristics biologically. Prison Commission medical staff became openly critical of eugenic proposals during the interwar years and, advised by a number of its medical personnel such as medical inspector and later Medical Commissioner William Norwood East, the Prison Commission was influenced towards the mental hygienism advocated by a growing number of American and British clinicians. Fherefore the Commission initiated a number of experiments in psychological treatment and psychoanalysis in English prisons.