Social Perspectives in Mental Health offers new practice frameworks that help to make sense of people's mental distress and recovery in relation to their social experience. This interdisciplinary volume promotes a holistic approach to mental health practice, with an emphasis on recovery and empowerment, and on building on the experiences of service users. The contributors explore the impact of social factors, such as power, abuse, ethnicity, gender and sexual orientation, on the causes and experiences of mental health problems. It is also considered how concepts such as risk and recovery can be understood from a social perspective. Drawing on expertise from a wide range of academic, policy and practice settings as well as lived experience, this book is essential reading for practitioners, students and educators in the fields of mental health and social work.