ABSTRACT
This chapter aims at clarifying the concept of community control, raising the major issues surrounding it, and considering the varying degrees of control found in community mental health centers as reported in the literature. It provides review of some community participation precedents in health and welfare service, distinction of the differences among community involvement, participation, and control and their corresponding ideologies, and presentation of excerpts from case studies of community mental health boards. Programs ‘by the poor’ characterize the advisory model which emphasized ‘maximum feasible participation’ by the target population in the implementation of services. The consumer movement and community control struggles over local health services are empirical manifestations of conflict that derive largely from dissatisfaction with professional dominance. The mental health power structure is composed of parallel bureaucratic agencies which, by virtue of their control over professional and financial resources, cooperate in their own mutual support and maintain the decision making power within the field.
