Human Rights in Mental Health – FGIP

Human Rights in Mental Health – FGIP is an international federation of not-for-profit organizations that promote humane, ethical and effective mental health care throughout the world. The organization aims to empower people and help build improved and sustainable services that are not dependent on continued external support. The defense of human rights in mental health care delivery is the cornerstone of our work. We consider it our prime obligation to speak out whenever and wherever human rights abuses in mental health practice occur, and work with local partners to amend the situation and make sure the human rights violations in question are discontinued. The basis in all our activities is partnership.

Human Rights in Mental Health-FGIP was founded in 1980 as the International Association on the Political Use of Psychiatry (IAPUP). In 1980-1989 it coordinated the campaigns against the political abuse of psychiatry in the Soviet Union and Romania, and in several other countries. Starting in 1989-1990, it became actively involved in developing humane, ethical and user-oriented mental health services in Central and Eastern Europe and the former USSR. Since 2005 it is also active in other countries, e.g. in South-East Asia, Sri-Lanka, Africa and the Caribbean. All these years, human rights have remained the cornerstone of our work.

We actively support the development of mental health care services in developing countries. We strive to ensure that every person can participate in society as fully as possible, irrespective of the fact whether he/she is a hospitalized psychiatric patient in Sri Lanka, a person with an intellectual disability in Ukraine or an AIDS-orphan in South Africa. In order to bring about structural reforms in mental health, we work at grass root level together with local partners and at governmental level with politicians and policy makers. In our work cultural-specific issues have a prime focus.