THIS MONTH’S ISSUE: AN INTERNATIONAL ONE?

I am impressed with the international flavour of the Journal this month, with the senior authors of the 16 papers coming from Australia, China, Iran, Italy, Japan, The Netherlands and the United States, as well as from the UK, and there is a stimulating article on the globalisation of mental disorders to boot. However, after attending a World Health Organization meeting between 20 and 21 November on the role of scientific journals in changing mental health research in developing countries, I became aware that ‘international’ as an adjective is sometimes used a little too loosely. As Benedetto Saraceno, Director of the Mental Health Section, put it to us, ‘“international” is not one Dutch and two English people talking at a meeting; to be international it has to be global, with representation from North and South, and low- and middle- as well as highincome countries’. I think this issue has just about reached the Saraceno threshold but we were reminded that very few journals achieve this currently. An agreement was reached at the WHO meeting about redressing the balance; readers of the Journal will hear more about this soon.

TANTRUMS IN TUSCANY

Even to seasoned observers of Italian psychiatry the events of 16 May 2003 may have raised a few eyebrows. An international meeting was held at one of the finest Medici villas in Montelupo, south of Florence, now a high-security penitentiary. As with many international meetings across language boundaries, the papers were delivered into an ether of incomprehension only partly rescued by translation, and these slowly induced somnolence as the temperature outside rose. Then Peppe was introduced, or was it Marco Cavallo, and sleep beckoned again. But what was that? People in the audience were shouting at Peppe or Marco and he was shouting back; he was clearly very angry. I looked around, and it was clear the penitentiary patients had invaded the meeting. But they all had papers in their hands as they shouted. All the world's a stage, but what was the play? This became little clearer as the meeting degenerated into chaos. The audience, speakers and staff all milled into the courtyard where the real Marco Cavallo, a bright-blue papier mâché horse with the most enormous buttocks, towed a large sleepy beast of uncertain parentage and poor dentition, the dragon of Montelupo, towards the main gates of the penitentiary. The gates were raised and the townspeople waiting on the other side cheered wildly as a brass band accompanied the throng to the market square.

So what was it all about? Who was the hero, who the villains? I am not sure, but one thing that Peppe said at the height of his angry discourse gave me a clue. ‘All forensic psychiatric hospitals should be closed; they do not prevent violence, they only reproduce it’.

DOGGEREL OF THE MONTH

A debate is taking place in the echelons of the Royal College of Psychiatrists about the possibility of a change of name of the Journal. In the spirit of inclusion we would like to open it up to the readership. Here is the debate so far: