As a global development priority, mental health is a challenge beyond the scope of a single discipline. It requires new modes of inquiry to advance new knowledge and support practices. The proposed study aims to offer new insights on mental distress following the political conflict in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) - a site of various post-war development interventions. One of the rare development successes was the introduction of community mental health services, including the development of organisations run or led by people who use mental health services as experts by experience (EBE).

To date, the impact of the war on mental health is mainly conceptualised and researched through Western and medicalised understanding of mental distress. Reforms in BiH have been criticised for being predominately shaped by donor interests. Meaningful engagement with EBE has been identified as missing from much global mental health research and practice, particularly in low- and middle-income countries. This exploratory study will be implemented through co-production by two professionals with a variety of disciplinary backgrounds and two BiH EBE. It will entail narrative interviews with people from two BiH regions on their experiences of mental distress and support they received.

The proposed research is underpinned by the emerging interdisciplinary field of Mad Studies which offers a critical challenge to the medical model of mental distress. It takes an interdisciplinary approach to contextualising and historicising madness. Furthermore, narrative analysis of the data will utilise the concept of border thinking from decolonial theory, enabling focus on the lived dimension of experiences which have been excluded from knowledge production. In line with the ISRF goals, this study will offer insights into novel ways of understanding and supporting people experiencing mental distress and promote them across a variety of relevant fields and disciplines.