Book review: The Dawn of Australian Psychiatry
| Author | Fabian Bryant |
| DOI | 10.1177/000486586900200317 |
| Published date | 01 September 1969 |
| Date | 01 September 1969 |
AUST. &N.Z. JOURNAL OF CRIMINOLOGY (1969): 2, 3 187
of
treatment
dimensions and diagnostic
types of various criminal offenders.
Like so
many
books of readings in the
social sciences with different contributors,
the book fails,
at
least for this reviewer,
because it does
not
co-ordinate one
article
with
another. Its usefulness, both
to
the
practising prison
administrator
and
to
the
academic criminologlst, is therefore
Iimited.
"The Tasks of Penology," though, repre-
sents
adifferent proposition. To my mind
it is an important book, abook which
should be or interest to
a11
Australian and
New Zealand criminologists.
Most Nebraska University symposiums
in the social sciences provide
the
oppor-
tunity
for noted social scientists to
gather
tagether
and discuss openly crucial prob-
lems in
their
respective fields. In the
field or psychology and sociology for
example, the Nebraska symposiums have
considerably added to
important
literature
on avariety of topics.
This
particular
symposium
has
brought
together
acollection of I a w y e r s,
sociologlsts and practitioners, who at-
tempt
to
answer
.the question
whether
we
can improve
our
prisons
and
yet
deter
the
potential criminal. The
fact
that
the
book fails to provide us
with
any sig-
niftcant advances in this
area
is
not
a
fault of
the
symposium's contributors,
but
rather
simply areflection of
our
state
of
knowledge on the subject. The book,
though, points
out
explicitly
the
dilemmas
between the demands of control in the
prison situation and the desire for change
- as it were, between punishment and
rehabilitation. These two objectives
are
what
places the correctional apparatus, in
the
words
of one writer, in an "uneasy
and irrational equlllbrium".
The book is only concerned with the
American penal
system
and
therefore, for
Australian readers, suffers obvious limita-
tions. Tocqueville's observation t
hat
"while society in the United
States
gives
the example of the most extended liberty,
the prisons of the same
country
offer
the
spectacle of the most complete des-
potlsm", may be
tao
harsh
ajudgment
for modern day American prisons,
but
the symposium shows clearly
that
archaic
theories and practices still abound in
American correctional institutions.
In the three
Part
One articles (Men-
ninger, Leopold and Mueller) we find a
comprehensive examination of
the
con-
cepts underlying present
day
correctional
law, particularly as applied to prisoners;
excellent specific proposals for improving
the
rehabilitation function of
the
prisons
system
(a
"must"
for alI
prison
adminis-
trators); and an exploration or
the
ways
in which the rule of
law
might be applied
more effectively to corrections.
Parts
Two, Three and Four of the book deal
respectively with
future
trends in correc-
tional organizations; w i t h sentencing
methods (including an excellent
chapter
by Theodore Levin on more enlightened
sentencing
procedures);
and
a final sec-
tion of
the
book dealing
with
possible
reforms in
other
correctional institutions.
At a time in Australia's
penal
history
when
the
winds or
change
for
reform
are
currently
blowing, this book should be
read by
both
the prison
administrator
and
the
academic criminologist. The
articles in the symposium will provide
a11
interested
parties
with a basis for
further
discussion
and
incentive for
future
action
in prison correctional procedures. In
addition, it Introduces us to
new
reforms
in American penal systems
practlcally
and
politically feasible for Australasian prisons.
P.
WILSON,
Lecturer in Public Opinion and
Communication,
University of Queensland.
The Dawn 01 Australian Psychiatry, J.
Bostock, A.M.A. Medical Monograph. 1968,
219 pp.
PROFESSOR Bostock's slim volume covers
the institutional
care
of mentaUy ill from
the time of
the
First
Fleet, 1788, to 1850.
There is a helpful review of
the
back-
ground of English psychiatry
and
penal
system
together
with the Australian social
context. It covers in detail
the
develop-
ment
of institutions in New
South
Wales
and, in lesser detail, in the
other
States.
The development or
pauper
asylum ser-
vices is
traced
through storms and calms
with aclarity based on careful research
and
alucid style. The book provides a
clear description of
many
forces operating
to shape
our
heritages of laws, of adminis-
trative
precepts, of hospital
architecture
and of public
attitudes
towards
mental
ill-
ness. It illustrates well
the
aphorism
that
the more things change, the
more
they
are
the
same.
Continuing conflicts
are
illustrated such
as public parsimony with phases of
generosity for the asylums; conflicts of
restraint
versus non-restraint; conflict of
lay versus medical administration; eonfliets
of decision making by
"distant
bureau-
crats"
with
decisions made by
"men
on
the
spot"
and conflicts or
custody
with
the expectation or curative
treatment
are
a11
illustrated.
The
author's
sympathy is
strongly
with
the hospital superintendents,
both
lay
and
medical,
whom
he presents as
the
heroes
protecting
their
patients and staff against
great
odds in the form of phases of bureau-
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