Recovery from mental illness: The guiding vision of the mental health service system in the 1990s.

he implementation of deinstitutionalization in the 1960s and 1970s, and the increasing ascendance of the community support system concept and the practice of psychiatric rehabilitation in the 1980s, have laid the foundation for a new 1990s vision of service delivery for people who have mental illness. Recovery from mental illness is the vision that will guide the mental health system in this decade. This article outlines the fundamental services and assumptions of a recovery-oriented mental health system. As the recovery concept becomes better understood, it could have major implications for how future mental health systems are designed. The seeds of the recovery vision were sown in the aftermath of the era of deinstitutionalization. The failures in the implementation of the policy of deinstitutionalization confronted us with the fact that a person with severe mental illness wants and needs more than just symptom relief. People with severe T CHANGING TOWARD THE FUTURE