Rebuilding solidarity: An account of a men's health action project

The literature on men's health has tended to link men's psychological distr ess with the negative effects of male socialization and masculinity. This a nalysis ignores social class influences on the experience and communication of distress, is at risk of misrepresenting the nature of working class men 's experience, and may lead to practice that is oriented towards intrapsych ic approaches or men's 'inner worlds'. This paper reports on a grassroots m ental health initiative called the Men's Advice Network set up in the west area of Nottingham, UK, for men experiencing psychological distress who hav e been unemployed for over one year. The project was based on ideas from Ho lland's work in London, which attempted to link psychotherapeutic work with social action. The project described here attempted to take account of wor king class experience by emphasizing the role of the group rather than the individual, the social as opposed to the intrapsychic aetiology of distress , and the role of action rather than introspection. Copyright (C) 1999 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.