patients in public mental hospitals innthe early 60’s. During the next decade,nfour of every five would be released.nThis is what that word is all about.n”Deinstitutionalization,” says Torrey,n”which originally implied services,nfollow-up, and aftercare, has insteadnbeen an act of dumping unpreparednpatients into unwilling and unreadyncommunities.” The community healthncenters, rather than attempting to carenfor the depressing, seriously ill expatients,nturned instead to schools forndrunken drivers and to fawning overnthe “worried well.” As a consequence,nupwards of 200,000 mentally ill arennow left with “nowhere to go” but tonwander the streets of every large city innthe nation. The drain on the alreadynstrained budgets and energy resourcesnof large cities — for police, indigentnhealth care, and public assistance —nhas been enormous. Lack of aftercarenfor the mentally ill has produced economicnand political aftershocks thatnhave shaken city governments.nTorrey provides us with good newsnand bad news. The bad news is that wenhave learned so little from the tragedy.nThe issue continues to be dominatednby those public officials, many ofnwhom maintain that the homelessnmentally ill are individuals withoutnhomes who became mentally ill becausenthey were homeless. Remembernthat was the argument of those whonemptied the mental hospitals in thenfirst place: these people behavenstrangely because they are locked up innmental hospitals. Thus, the victimsncannot be returned to the hospitals nornbe treated for their illness before theynare “decently housed” which, in effect,ndooms them to remain mentally ill onnthe streets.nThere are two pieces of good news.nFirst, Torrey says that there is sufficientnmoney available to provide excellentncare for the mentally ill — $17 billionnin 1985. (Isn’t it refreshing to hearnsomeone say that money is not thenproblem?) That is encouraging andnhalf the battle. And then, there is thisnbook. Reading the account of how anfew highly motivated visionaries werenable to change the entire structure ofncare for the mentally ill in a decade is antestament to perseverance. What isnneeded now — and desperately so bynthe suffering mentally ill on the sidewalksn— is a group of highly motivatednvisionaries dedicated to changing thenentire structure again, this time in thenbest interest of the mentally ill whonhave been made homeless. If there isnnot a group of men and women sondedicated already in place, then it is upnto the next administration to put themnthere.nDan McMurry is an associatenprofessor of sociology at MiddlenTennessee State University.nWeighing Freedomnby Juliana Geran PilonnFreedom in the World:nPolitical Rights andnCivil Liberties 1987-1988nby Raymond D. GastilnNew York: Freedom House; 450 pp.,n$29.50 (hardcover), $12.95 (paper)nThis yearbook, prepared by FreedomnHouse—a private nonprofitnfoundation from New York — is thententh in the series of annual comparativensurveys of political and civil libertiesnin the worid. Started in 1972, thenFreedom House project to assess thenstatus of freedom around the globe hasnbecome an indispensable gauge for anyoneninterested in the progress of liberty.nThe heart of the survey is a tablenrating each country on a seven-pointnscale for political and civil freedom,nthen providing an overall judgment ofneach as “free,” “partly free,” or “notnfree.” A rating of one indicates thenfreest, of seven the least free.nSuch tables, however, are not flawless.nPutting Argentina, for example, innthe same category as the United Statesn(“free”) will undoubtedly offend many,nas should the placement of dynamicnTaiwan alongside still-Communist Polandnand increasingly pro-Soviet Nicaraguan(all “partly free”). To consider Irannand Zimbabwe, as the survey does,n”partly free,” alongside South Koreanand Singapore, is also peculiar —nsuggesting a need for finer distinctions.nIn addition to the table itself there arenbrief summaries of the human rightsnsituation in every country. While lessndetailed than the State Department’snannual Country Reports on HumannRights, the survey summaries offer annnnevaluation of every nation’s attitudentoward the individual.nAnd this is where the problems start.nThe statement, for instance, that innRomania “Soviet influence is relativelynslight” is simpleminded at best, givennthe interrelation of the two countries’nintelligence services. The section onnAfghanistan says nothing about Sovietnuse of chemical warfare against the localnpopulation, of toy bombs that havenmaimed children, or other terroristntactics — making it less accurate evennthan the relatively restrained SpecialnRapporteur’s Report on Afghanistannprepared for the UN Human RightsnCommission. Similarly, the section onnIsrael makes no mention of Palestiniannattacks against Jews — as would be requirednto put the picture in properncontext. Moreover, nowhere in the surveynis there any discussion of statesponsorednterrorism and its uses. Sincenterrorist attacks obviously violate humannrights, some sort of discussion of thensubject would have been helpful.nThe essays in Freedom in the Worldnare also disappointing at best, beginningnwith the introductory piece bynRaymond Gastil. Gastil warns us, fornexample, not to take literally the claimnof countries calling themselves “Democratic”n(as in “German DemocraticnRepublic”), but then issues the samenwarning about German fascists, claimingnthat their “National Socialist” labelnwas fraudulent. Yet socialists they certainlynwere, albeit somewhat less totalitariannthan their internationalistnbrethren.nStill more disappointing is the analysisnof freedom by Thomas D. Anderson,ngeography professor at BowlingnGreen State University in Ohio. Henplaces countries in six categories, thenmost favorable of which is “countriesnwhere all elements of individual rightsnare specified by law and presently arenextended to all inhabitants without restriction.”nThe result, however, is thatncountries with more liberal immigrationnpolicies or a varied citizenry willnfare worse than their more restrictive ornhomogeneous counterparts because ofn”minorities” problems — not necessarilyncaused by legal impediments. InnAnderson’s ratings, culturally homogeneousnAustria is placed in group Inwhile the US, UK, and most Westernndemocracies are in group II. Yet surelynit would appear that part of what isnAPRIL 1989/43n