This paper discusses the role and importance of voluntary agencies in the promotion of mental health and the rationale for such a role. As the socioeconomic and political problems of societies grow more acute everyday, the potential solutions seem increasingly to indicate the need to make wiser and more effective use of all human resources and potential. Many of the solutions to these problems seem to call for the return of responsibility for making institutions effective to the people and the community to be served, through voluntary work for the common good. This is especially true of the voluntary work undertaken by relatives and citizens in mental health and other institutions. In this period of economic stringency, which seems likely to remain with us for some time, communities, in order to maintain services, have to rely on the contributions of volunteers and voluntary agencies.
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