ABSTRACT
The social and legal construction of mental illness in Tonga has long been a contested matter. Traditional notions of madness are little understood outside of Tonga, and medico-legal ones are little understood within Tonga. While never formally colonized, Tonga has had a close historical relationship with Great Britain, formalized at the turn of the twentieth century by the Treaty of Berlin and the later so-called Treaty of Friendship with Tonga in 1905. In addition to exerting control over Tonga’s foreign affairs, this treaty also allowed for key roles in certain Tongan judicial institutions to be filled by expatriates from the United Kingdom. As a result, Tonga’s law continued down a path of policy and law transfer profoundly influenced by British jurisprudence. The law of mental health, with its necessary categorization of a species of deviant behavior as within its scope, was no small exception. Moreover, it was not only the categorization of those with mental illness that was transferred to Tonga but also state institutions, such as the national prison and hospital’s mental health unit, used for separating, for detaining, and recently for treating individuals with mental illness.
