Basaglia's Effect

Franco Basaglia (1924-1980) is definitely the Italian psychiatrist—of those no longer alive—who is best known to the Italians; he is one of the Italian psychiatrists best known in the world, together with Cesare Lombroso, Bruno Tanzi, Ugo Cerletti and Ugo Bini.1 Everyone—or almost everyone—in Italy knows that Basaglia inspired the “180 law,” approved in 1978, the law that abolished the lunatic asylums. In fact, the law is known as the “Basaglia law.” In Italy, he enjoys the same mythic status that Philippe Pinel still does in France: the enlightened doctor who freed the mentally ill from their shackles. When he was alive, however, his notoriety went way beyond the borders of Italy. In Spain and Latin American countries, he became the point of reference for anti-institutional psychiatry.

Despite this notoriety, however, his thoughts and the meaning of his practical actions—and those of his followers, still active and organized in the society Psichiatria Democratica (Democratic Psychiatry)—are usually widely misunderstood, even in Italy.

I was regularly in Franco Basaglia's company over a couple of months as a student of psychology at University VII Paris in 1971, during my psychiatric internship at the Psychiatric Hospital of Trieste, of which he was already the director.

That year, I knew that Basaglia had come to Paris to hold a lecture, and I hastened to invite him to speak at the Italian Home at the Cité Universitaire, where I was in charge of the cultural programs. He came, and many people were there to listen to him. It was clear that Basaglia was well known in France; the French translation of his book L'istituzione negata (The Negated Institution) had made quite an impression in that country. The translator was somewhat embarrassed because Basaglia didn't avoid the language of obscenity when he wanted to explain what he meant, even when he was quoting Nietzsche and Artaud.

At that time, I knew the Clinique de la Borde, near Blois, for psychotic patients. La Bord