Psy-science and the colonial relationship in the mental health field
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/MHRJ-03-2014-0006 |
| Published date | 02 September 2014 |
| Pages | 176-184 |
| Date | 02 September 2014 |
| Author | W.J. Penson |
| Subject Matter | Health & social care,Mental health |
Psy-science and the colonial relationship in
the mental health field
W.J. Penson
W.J. Penson is a Research
Student, based at University
of Central Lancashire,
Preston, UK.
Abstract
Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to critically discuss how the psy-sciences have been, and continue
to be, typified by some critics, as colonizers and are credited with Imperialistic motivations. However, rarely
are these critiques developed beyond a pejorative characterisation.
Design/methodology/approach – This paper reviews the criticisms of psychiatry as colonial and outlines
the tensions in taking different frames of reference in the mental health field, before going on to suggest
theoretical and research perspectives arising from postcolonial theory that might advance these critical
positions more coherently and the implications of doing so.
Findings – This study suggests an engagement with humanities-based methods and fields such as
postcolonial scholarship.
Social implications – This argument is timely, especially given recent controversies over the publication of
DSM5, the scaling up agenda for mental health in the Global South and increased attention to the agenda
of Big Pharma.
Originality/value – Postcolonial intersections with psy-science remains a relatively undeveloped area in
the critical literature.
Keywords Mental health, Postcolonial, Humanities, Psychiatry, Colonizer, Psy-science
Paper type Conceptual paper
Introduction
Colonial framings of the psy-sciences[1] have tended towards the historicity of psychiatry,
noting the growth of certain disciplines (psychiatry, psychology, sociology, criminology,
sexology) as a contingency within the European Imperial “project” of the nineteenth and early
twentieth century. The “alienist” activities that came to form our modern psychiatry began prior
to the imperial period in the confessional forms of Christianity (the Christian pastoral), and early,
growing intersections between law and medicine (Foucault, 1978, 2003).
A number of publications propose a colonizing presence of the psy-sciences and allied
disciplines; some of these publications will be reviewed in the next section. They tend to draw
on three formulations of psy-science in relation to colonialism, the first being that psy-science is
a variably racist Western practice within the global North. Second, that psy-science is a product
of Europe and the USA and is imposed upon other peoples directly such as those of the Global
South (see Mills, 2014 for an account of such activity). Third, psy-science is a colonizer because
it is a discourse that is enacted upon the mental health service user or patient other, who
becomes subjugated, subjectivized and thus colonized person (and community). This last
formulation includes notions of the “colonization of minds” (Ngu
˜gı
˜, 1986; Fanon, 1952/2008),
a particular kind of “racism” (Foucault, 2003) not necessarily predicated on ethnicity. Such
colonizing processes would perhaps include diagnosis as the power to describe and designate
in a subject-object relation of unequal power which is often cited as a theme within postcolonial
literature[2]. These formulations draw on the history of psychiatry and psychology as disciplines
This is submitted as part of the
author’s PhD research studies and
thanks are given to Professors
Tim Thornton and Alan Rice
(UCLAN) for supervision and
feedback.
PAGE 176
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MENTAL HEALTH REVIEW JOURNAL
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VOL. 19 NO. 3 2014, pp. 176-184, CEmerald Group Publishing Limited, ISSN 1361-9322 DOI 10.1108/MHRJ-03-2014-0006
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