Very little competition - most that exists on the subject is very out-of-date
Good sales of previous titles in the series
Strong contributors
Comparative emphasis of the chapters (eg. British, Irish, Colonial) is strong
Revisits the revisionism of Foucault - anything related to him is of strong interest and sells well
Routledge has a strong presence in the history of madness eg ' History of Bethlem' was widely reviewed
'The editors and contributors to Insanity, Institutions and Society deserve our thanks for significantly expanding our understanding of the rise of the asylum in nineteenth-century Britain.' - Gerald N. Grob, Rutgers University
'This excellent collection focuses on the early English county asylum system; shifts in therapeutic regimes; the reform of administrative structures in Wales, Scotland and Ireland; and contemporaneous developments in South Africa and the Raj' - Bill Luckin, Economic History Review
Len Smith, Birmingham; Peter Bartlett, Nottingham University; Pamela Michael and David Hirst, both at University of Wales, Bangor; David Wright, Nottingham University; Waltraud Ernst, Southampton University; Andrew Scull, University of California; Bill Forsythe, Richard Adair and Jo Melling all at Exeter University; Shula Marks, SOAS, University of London; Oonagh Wa;sh, University of Aberdeen; Lorraine Walsh; Jonathan Andrews, Oxford Brookes University; Akihito Suzuki, University of Tokyo; Hilary Marland, University of Warwick.