Mental Health Nursing and Social Control

This work examines the current status of mental-health nursing and the role that this discipline plays in society. Following a review of the literature relating to the status of nursing in general, and mental-health nursing in particular, the author draws on sociological theory of the professions, and the findings of his own research into mental-health nurses working in the community. He concludes that, as a distinct occupational group, nurses must let go of the unobtainable goal of professionalization and seek an alternative future.