Medicalization of Deviance

I. Process of Medicalization

        A. First, definition of behavior as deviant

        B. Second stage = "Prospecting": medical "discovery"

        C. Third Stage: Claims-Making

                1. non-medical interests

                2. medical interests

        D. Fourth Stage: Legitimacy: Securing Medical Turf

                1. Legislative (Official) Redefinition

                2. State approval is essential

        E. Fifth Stage: Instituionalization of a Medical Deviance Designation

                1. codification

                2. bureaucratization

II. Larger Generalizations (about medicalization)

        A. Medicalization and De-Medicalization are cyclical phenomena

        B. Redefinition is related to most extreme definitions

        C. Medical definitions are "foils" against criminal definitions

                1. "humanitarian" challenges to punishment

        D. Small segment of the profession is involved in   medicalization

        E. Claims often based on "compulsivity"

        F. Medicalization (and reverse) is a political, not a scientific, achievement

        G. Medicalization follows failure or crisis in alternative control system

        H. Medicalization is class-related

         I. Medicalization is profit-related

III. Evaluating Medicalization

        A. Some humanitarian benefits

        B. Concerns

                1. problem of expert control

                2. problem of medical social control

                3. individualizes social problems

                4. depoliticization of deviance

                        a. eg, psychiatry in totalitarian systems 

 

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