This research project explores how activists in the (post-)Yugoslav space have worked to make psychiatry more humane, democratic, and community-oriented. After Yugoslavia’s breakup, many important activist efforts were forgotten, especially those aimed at reducing violence in psychiatric care, questioning the power of large mental hospitals, and giving more control to people living with mental health difficulties. These efforts remained largely invisible, partly because psychiatry in the region has often been closely associated with authoritarian and patriarchal values. Rather than welcoming critical ideas from the social sciences and wider activist circles, psychiatry has often supported conservative political agendas while rarely questioning its own role and assumptions. This study draws attention to three waves of activism: one in the 1980s, involving groups in Belgrade and Ljubljana who sought to shift care into community settings; one during and immediately after the wars of the 1990s, when professionals in Bosnia and Herzegovina worked to rebuild services outside of institutions; and a more recent wave from 2000 to 2020, when user-led and LGBTQ activist groups in Serbia and Croatia began offering alternative therapeutic services. This research is based on interviews, documentary analysis, and direct observation of conferences, public debates, and therapeutic group sessions. By focusing on the voices of activists, service users, and marginalised communities, this project highlights their role in advocating for fairer and more inclusive mental health care. It also challenges the common tendency to analyse post-Yugoslav countries in isolation by tracing how activists have collaborated across borders during and after the breakup of Yugoslavia.