Examining the mistreatment of persons with mental disabilities around the world, Michael Perlin identifies universal factors that contaminate mental disability law, including lack of comprehensive legislation and of independent counsel; inadequate care; poor or nonexistent community programming; and inhumane forensic systems.

• Chapter 1: Introduction and overview


• Chapter 2: International human rights: Legal issues and social constructs


• International human rights in legal perspective


• Sanism and pretextuality


• Dignity


• Chapter 3: Mental disability law in a comparative law context


• Chapter 4: The use of mental disability law to suppress political dissent


• Chapter 5: The universal factors


• Chapter 6: The application of international human rights law to mental disability law: specific contexts


• Law school pedagogy


• Expert evidence law


• Psychotherapist-patient law


• Corrections law


• Chapter 7: The UN Convention: The impact of the new UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities on international mental disability law


• Chapter 8: The UN Convention: The role of counsel


• Chapter 9: A Disability Rights Tribunal for Asia and the Pacific


• Chapter 10: Therapeutic Jurisprudence


• Chapter 11: Conclusion


• References


• Index

Michael L. Perlin is a professor of law at New York Law School, where he is also Director of the International Mental Disability Law Reform Project and Director of the Online Mental Disability Law Program. He has taught and done advocacy work on six continents and is the author of 20 books and over 200 articles on all aspects of mental disability law. He spent eight years as director of the New Jersey Division of Mental Health Advocacy, where he provided legal services to individuals in cases involving civil commitment, institutional rights, and community care issues.