People with a wide range of mental health and neurodevelopmental conditions are found amongst criminal justice populations, and many present with co-occurring disorders. These may include other neurodevelopmental conditions, substance use disorders or physical health conditions. It is now standard practice to use a pathways approach to organise and deliver services, and journeys taken by many people within criminal justice systems lend themselves to this, at least in theory. Basic requirements of this approach include police custody and prison reception screening, providing organised multidisciplinary care and introducing appropriate interventions as part of individual care plans. There is much we still do not know about vulnerable people in prisons, and service provision remains far from optimal. In particular, insufficient specialist provision means that many people with neurodevelopmental conditions are not identified appropriately, and do not have their needs met as they should. Further, in the absence of support, the presentations of some people render them vulnerable to specific aspects of prison life.

From the earliest period of British invasion of the lands now referred to as Australia, white authorities have removed Indigenous children from their communities. Sana Nakata even states that ‘the history of Australia is a history of interventions into the childhoods of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people’. In this chapter, we describe how Indigenous child removal has been perpetrated in Australia since 1914. We consider the period from 1914 until the 1980s, during which the removal of Indigenous children was explicitly enabled under a growing range of laws and policies. While it is impossible to calculate the exact number of children removed during this period, the National Inquiry into the Separation of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Children from their Families (henceforth ‘the National Inquiry’), headed by federal judge Sir Ronald Wilson, concluded in 1997 that ‘Most [Indigenous] families have been affected, in one or more generations, by the forcible removal of one or more children.’ In this chapter, we also consider the contemporary context, from the 1990s onwards, in which Australian governments have apologised for the historic Stolen Generations but continue to remove Indigenous children from their families in rising numbers.

The authors critique trauma and illness models of the effects of adversity, and go on to consider alternative societal and political understandings.They then review biological insights from attachment theory and affective neuroscience. An analogy with grief leads to consideration of post-traumatic growth, and adversity activated development.

A review of symptoms resulting from adversity then leads to consideration of the factors that help people rebuild their lives after major adversity, such as safety and security, interpersonal bonds, and networks.A positive sense of one’s identity and role, and feeling that life is just and meaningful, also helps.Effects of the asylum process often counter these factors.

People’s problems often have to be categorised as ‘health’ issues in order to access care. Positive and negative effects of this are reviewed.

People in the asylum system who might benefit from mental health care frequently find it very difficult to access this.

Some do not seek help, perhaps because they do not expect mental health services to be helpful or because of fear, stigma, or wanting to avoid the processes of help-seeking.Those who do seek help encounter multiple challenges including language barriers, the limitations of health care provision within the asylum system, difficulties negotiating primary care, NHS charges, practical difficulties in getting to a first appointment, and service eligibility criteria. People may face barriers linked to their age, gender, sexuality, or being destitute.

The chapter offers a typology of obstacles to reaching effective mental health care as a step towards considering how these may be addressed.This considers the context (resource limitations /ambivalence about providing equal care) and the sources of specific obstacles, including ‘hostile’ asylum policies. Recurring themes include the need for accessible information,friendly compassionate staff, cultural competence, access to qualified interpreters, appropriately trained staff, and a willingness to be flexible.

Indigenous people have been subject to racialised legislation and practice across all jurisdictions in Australia. This chapter characterises the fight against these as the Aboriginal civil rights movement. We trace key moments is this history, looking at the connections and movement building undertaken by different Indigenous people and organisations. Starting in 1927 with the founding of Australian Aboriginal Progressive Association (AAPA), the other significant political resistance we look at are - 1938 Day of Mourning, 1956 founding of the Australian-Aboriginal Fellowship (AAF), 1958 the Federal Council for Aboriginal Advancement (FCAA), the 1965 Freedom Rides, and the 1967 Referendum. We end by turning to the 1970s Black Power movement and the new ways Aboriginal people undertook social change battles.

Karl Marx’s atheism is well known, even if his criticism of religion has more often than not been misconstrued. The distortions to his critical theory of religion stem from common misperceptions of the philosophical, political, and cultural context in which key statements on religion were formulated – and exacerbated by interpretations of his work that trade in anachronisms. The subsequent history of Marxism’s attitude to religion (and Marxism’s reading of Marx’s texts on religion), has itself been shaped by the different contexts in which Marxism has been either a revolutionary social movement, or a state ideology in which atheism has become part of the Marxist confession of faith. Marx’s atheism is multifaceted; some aspects are relatively banal, others appear either antiquated or naive; the criticism of religion formed at the nexus of his politics and dialectical thinking continue to provide a stimulating starting point and sounding board for thinking about religion today.

This chapter considers the importance of evaluation in understanding the effectiveness of your health promotion program and highlights the value of knowing why something does or does not work. It outlines basic evaluation methods used in health promotion, and considers the benefits and weaknesses of qualitative and quantitative methods respectively.