Under the supervision of Christelle Rabier
This doctoral project looks at contemporary changes in the institutional interdependencies that govern the operation of French public psychiatry. From the 2000s onwards, public policy on the management of psychiatric establishments in closed environments began to take a security-oriented turn, at the same time as the legal framework for hospitalisation without consent and under restraint was being consolidated. While these reforms have increased the decision-making powers of the administrative authorities, they have above all introduced a new judicial player into the control of such hospitalisations, with the obligation to have recourse to the Juge des libertés et de la détention. Adopting a socio-ethnographic approach to public action, this research proposes to study the new institutional regulations governing hospitalisation and forced care measures, against a backdrop of securitisation of care facilities, through a survey of specialised hospitals and units for difficult patients. What are the struggles being waged by the various players involved in defining these public health policies? How is this coordination of public action helping to change care and control practices in the field of French psychiatry?
