Les médiateurs pairs en santé mentale

Abstract

The paper focuses on the attempt to create a profession, i.e. the profession of “Health Peer Mediator” in mental health. HPMs (in French: MSPs, for “médiateurs de santé pairs”) are ex-patients of psychiatry, currently recovering, hired as mediators by psychiatric departments in three French ”Regions", in the frame of an experimental plan (2012-2014). The concept of inventing a hospital profession was from the beginning part of this programme. It's sociological originality is to be, rather than an emergence, a try of voluntary creation and also to challenge sturdy symbolic borders and, in fine, to count as many french and institutional strong supporters as, on the other side, decided opponents. The paper studies the strategy deployed, in the french and international contexts, by the promotors network, their hesitations and stakes, the difficulties they encounter. So it is a contribution to the sociological theory of professional groups and to the knowledge of current dynamics in the mental health sector.

Keywords

• mental health
• lay knowledge
• caring peers workers
• professionalisation
• competency
• psychiatric experience