Religion, ethnicity, and community mental health: service provision and identity politics in an unplanned Egyptian community

Successful community mental health programs depend on strongsocial networks and cooperation between resource providers,both of which are complex products of local culture and history.The results of an ethnographic study of an unplanned urban neighborhoodin Cairo, Egypt emphasize the importance of the political, socialand historical context to community service development. Theinformal nature of the community, characterized by migrantsfrom different ethnic and religious groups and a relative lackof governmental services, produced a culture of service provisionthat indirectly serves to accentuate religious and ethnic tensions.The findings are relevant not only to the developing world,but also to community program development in large, multiculturalurban centers anywhere.