Post Psychiatry
There is a vast body of research that suggests that while some people find psychiatric services helpful, many, particularly from BME communities, find them at best unhelpful and at worst oppressive and harmful. Some reject psychiatry as a way of understanding and interpreting their experiences. At the heart of SVB is a critique that has emerged from what has been termed Postpsychiatry, which provides a powerful justification for engaging with communities and their social/cultural contexts. Post Psychiatry raises the following key themes.
- Psychiatry developed out of western culture, and thus may not be relevant to non-Western communities who hold different values and perspectives on distress.
- It challenges the power dynamics within psychiatry which focuses attention on the expertise and understanding of people who live with distress. They know themselves what works best for them in enabling recovery.
- Promotes the importance of first person narratives (or stories) of people living with distress as a means of promoting recovery.
- Challenges the increasing medicalisation of Psychiatry.
- Argues for choice in mental health services and the recognition of different cultural, spiritual, gender and faith perspectives in mental health services.