The Portuguese colleagues took the Presidency on October 2022 in Florence. During this time there was attempt to involve Portuguese organizations and professionals and to develop the relational and democratic principles of INDTC. Trimestral webinars were undertaken during 2023 and 2024 with an average attendance of 10 – 15 people.

Another development was the creation of a monthly reading group, where relevant papers are discussed.

In September 2024 the Portuguese Presidency organized an international conference in Porto, under the theme “Relational Practice around the World: Why is it so important today”. The event began and ended with a meeting in a circle, recalling what is common in therapeutic communities. However, not everything went well at this event and some expectations were disappointed, as was found in the final meeting. These moments of sharing and the frustration felt created an opening to reflect on the next steps to be taken. And all of this will culminate in the choice of a new name for the project, this time not in the form of an acronym (INDTC-RP).

Furthermore, progress is being made towards the creation of an international association with its tax headquarters in the UK, avoiding bureaucracy that was sometimes paralyzing when the presidency changed hands.

11th October 2022: INDTC International Conference “Dialogue, Conflict, Green care. How to practice democracy in therapeutic communities and in society”, FIRENZE. As part of the 3rd Edition Of The Mental Health Marathon “On Community mental well-being. What directions for the future”.

In this event, a democratic vote took place on topics of interest that later on would became the focus of further exploration and development in web conferences and the international one in October 2022 that marked the handing over of the INDTC management from Italy to Portugal.

We finally found ourselves in presence, in Florence. There were Joao, Rex, Laura, Peter and many other friends and colleagues. It was a very emotional moment for me to finally find ourselves together after such a complex period.Today INDTC Italy is made up of a new board which includes (in addition to Raffaele Barone, Luca Mingarelli, Marino de Crescente), Martina Raniolo, Maria Giovanna Milano, Salvatore Marzolo, Giuseppe Cardamone, Alessandro Poddesu, Angelita Volpe, representatives from various Italian regions and from different places of treatment: CT for adults and adolescents, public mental health services, etc.

We are continuing to build together, among ourselves and with the precious collaboration of the international collective, other future events, that look in particular at dialogic and democratic practices and multifamily psychoanalysis.

7th-8th-9th April 2022: Collaboration At The Conference “New Vision Of Mental Health Services: Dialogical, Democratic And Community” organised by the MDSM of Caltagirone

22nd March 2022: International Web Conference: “How to practice democracy in non-democratic places and systems”. Born from the democratic vote during the Babel meeting

March 2022: Book Publication By Indtc: “Green Care. A Contribution From Therapeutic Communities” from the translation of the 2008 special edition of the international Journal of Therapeutic Communities enriched with contributions from Italy.

3rd-4th December 2021: Collaboration On The Web Conference “The Fracture Of Social Bonds” organised by the MDSM asp of caltagirone (rex haigh, laura liverotti, geoff dennis participated)

30th June 2021: Collaboration In Webinar “The Pandemic Context and Mental Health, the public services of Prato, Milan and Caltagirone compared” within the Community Mental Well-Being Cycle Organised By The Caltagirone MDSM

7th May 2021: International Web Conference “Babel Meeting”. Democratic voting on topics of interest.

The Meeting di Babele, in 2021, was born from the desire of the international collective and the INDTC board of directors to meet people who also had an interest in INDTC. We got together with people from various corners of the world, to tell how TCs are doing today and explore issues of common interest that could be developed further within the INDTC. An occasion that showed us how, despite the different languages and the different experiences, dialogue can still take place.

A chance also to have a dialogue about the difficulties as well as the possibilities of change that every crisis offers within itself. To plan for the future.

Exchange and dialogue on experiences and care practices between users, operators and family members of therapeutic communities.

11th JUNE 2020: Gnosis (Lazio), Lahuen (Umbria), Santo Pietro (Sicilia).

24th JULY 2020: 3 Italian Public Mental Health Services: Caltagirone (Sicilia), Prato (Toscana), Milano (Lombardia)

11th DECEMBER 2020: Sant’Antonio (Italia), Lilias Gillies House (Inghilterra), Mosaic (India), Casa de Alba (Portogallo).

April 2020: Web Conference “COVID-19 and Mental Health: INDTC in an International Dialogue”

12th March 2020: Web Conference “The Democratic Therapeutic Community Necessary in the Post-Modern Era, in the Contexts and in the Treatment Paths” in collaboration with the mito e realtà association and sponsored by confcooperative sanità.

March 2020: International Web Conference “Democracy And Community Mental Well-Being”

The Italian group managed INDTC from its re-establishment in 2019 until October 2022.

We were born right in the middle of the Covid pandemic; and those difficult moments that the whole world went through in that period, made us feel the need for discussion and closeness with others.
The International collective and the Italian board met often to reflect and plan events.

We have thus organised many online meetings, both national and international.
Those events responded to the desire and need for discussion, for cultural exchange and experiences, for shared reflection on common themes, for promotion of the values of democracy and dialogue, not only in TCs, but also in public mental health services, in the various care services and in the local community.

These events were highly participatory; they were important moments of mutual support in difficult times and in which individuals and care services, such as communities, experienced a sense of vulnerability and uncertainty.
Events like the Democratic Community Dialogues, aroused much enthusiasm: these were meetings were users, family members and workers could exchange and share their experiences on the daily life of CT and public mental health services, treatment practices, groups, etc.

With continuing economic austerity in the following years, CHT could not support the development of INDTC after the retirement of John Gale, so an international distribution of responsibility was planned.

This was by working particularly closely with Italian colleagues who remained very active in international TC collaboration, and including as many other countries as possible.

The initial plans for relaunch were made at an Anglo-Italian meeting held at Iver Environment Centre in October 2017, developed in Rome in November 2018 and finalised at the Cassel conference in September 2019.

The intention is to keep the international network that existed in the Linked-In groups, and develop more active membership, in more countries, through modern online methods as well as regular traditional conferences. An ‘International Collective’ will steer the organisation, and an organisation or group of organisations will take responsibility for day-to-day running of the organisation in periods of two years.

A group of Italian TCs (headed by Angelita Volpe, Luca Mingarelli and Raffaele Barone) is taking this on for the first period, 2019-2021.