Franco Basaglia

In my opinion, madness is a human condition. Madness exists within us and is as present as reason. The problem is that, to be civilized, society must accept both reason and madness.

 

Dear traveler, when I arrived in Gorizia in November 1961 to direct the Provincial Psychiatric Hospital, I felt profound indignation at the way human beings were being treated. Indeed, I would not have been able to propose anything psychiatric in a traditional asylum, where the patients were tied up, forced into a state of subjection by those who were supposed to be caring for them.

There could be no chance of treatment in a situation where there was no communication between doctor and patient. I immediately understood that closing mental hospitals was urgently needed, if not simply obvious.