Through questioning the concept of autonomy and the interface with exercising of rights, this paper aim to identify and comprehend the concept of the rights of psychosocial care center users, from the opinions of these users and those of managers of these services. This was a fourth-generation multicenter qualitative study in which material was gathered from focus groups and interviews, by means of audio recordings that were transformed into narratives. Interpretation of the data indicated that exercising of rights is achievable through the emergence of legal subjects. Through analyzing the relationships between these players, modulated by biopower, it could be seen that a circuit was formed, in which users were included. In the open, total practices produced means of control over users and over their exercising of rights, which might generate chronicity among users, workers, managers and services.
Mental health; Autonomy; Human rights; Psychiatry; Qualitative research