Every year World Mental Health Day is celebrated on 10 October and provides an opportunity to meaningfully engage with people with lived experience (PWLE) of mental health conditions and to recognize their knowledge as a vital form of expertise.

This year's campaign calls for their voices to help shape the policies, services, and decisions that affect their lives. When PWLE are genuinely involved in co-design, implementation, care, and evaluation, mental health systems are better positioned as more person-centered, rights-based, and responsive to the needs and concerns of those they serve.

Since its launch in 2007, International Journal of Mental Health Systems has been committed to advancing the promotion and protection of the human rights of people living with mental health conditions by providing a platform for transformative research on the design, implementation, and evaluation of mental health systems.

In keeping with this longstanding mission, the journal's new Lead Editors, Jesse Young and Craig Cumming, renew this long-standing commitment to strengthen the role of lived experience perspectives in mental health systems research and practice. To learn more about their vision for the journal, we invite you to read their recent editorial.

We welcome submissions that align with this vision, including original research, systematic reviews, brief reports, debates, and commentaries that contribute to advancing and shaping the field of global mental health.