30 Years of Recovery: Perspectives From an Aging Revolutionary

Mark Ragins, award-winning past medical director of the MHALA Village and long-term Recovery Movement leader reflects upon the progress and disappointments of the last 30 years developing and promoting recovery. He describes the Recovery Model as a true “Thomas Kuhn” revolution built on three paradigm shifts (from illness-centered to person-centered, from professionally-driven to client-driven, and from deficit-based to strengths-based). Since it has always been an outsider movement, it has grown up in isolated “bubbles”. Despite considerable accomplishments - in values, services, structures, outcomes, and tools - it has never been free to fully blossom into the full system it likely can be. Also, these bubbles have been more likely to compete with each other than to coalesce. A number of serious outside events in the last 15 years, from recessions to housing unaffordability to a pandemic may have limited Recovery?s ability to truly challenge and even replace the Medical Model system. True revolutions are always challenging and take time, but the “force” of the Recovery Movement is worth passing forwards to the next generation to create their own “spin-offs”.