Western neoliberal societies are marked by psychiatrization and therapy culture; psy disciplines have prominent power and impact. The growth of incidence of diagnosis of mental disorders is typical. I wrote this master's degree to discover what is behind these phenomenons: I explained the field of mentality at both individual and societal levels from sociology's aspect, I reflected it and critically considered its functions and implications. Psy disciplines convert the problems, which are created at the macro levels of society into personal mental healht problems in a very reductionist way. They individualise mental distress and problems and through psychiatric way of thinking label them as "mental disorders", classified in DSM. They treat them with psychopharmacological solutions. In fact, it is necessary to place the source of these "mental disorders" in circumstances of neoliberalism, which creates many burdens, as well as a lot of pressure and stress. Mental distress and problems are often a completely normal response to the described life circumstances. More over, the narrowing of the boundaries of mental "normalcy" is to be detected, which means that smaller and smaller deviations from social norms and social desirable states in the field of mentality are pathologised. It is essential that we are aware of the processes in which certain characteristics of mentality are labeled as deviant and pathological. The master's degree is primarely based on the analysis of the existing literature, on the basis of which I have discussed different views on psychiatry and therapeutic culture, and highlighted the most important factors that determine this current happenings. I would like to draw attention to the long-term inadequacy of psychiatric solutions and the need for institutional, systemic and structural changes in neoliberal societies.
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