Psychotherapy as care in Uganda: envisioning a “more-than-critique anthropology”

Abstract

AbstractOver the past two decades, care has become a key concept in psychological anthropology, and anthropology more broadly. Although the term generally evokes positive associations, anthropological studies mostly focus on the darker or ambivalent aspects of care such as paternalism, exploitation, or instrumentalism. This article rethinks anthropological critiques of care. Drawing on examples from my research on emerging forms of psychotherapy in Uganda, I argue that it is important to retain some of the hopeful properties of care: not because critiques of care are invalid, but because the contemporary global moment—characterized by widespread sentiments of powerlessness, futility, and paralysis in the face of climate change, pandemics, and war—calls for an anthropology that can do more than just critique. The article focuses on the struggles and achievements of a small group of Ugandan therapists, who were at the forefront of establishing psychotherapy as a new form of care in Uganda. For them, psychotherapy offered new ways of critically reflecting on social conventions, norms, and hierarchies in Ugandan society, as well as capitalist modernity more broadly. Even though they were aware of, and shared, various criticisms of psychotherapy—its colonial origins, cultural biases, and neoliberal tendencies—my interlocutors strongly believed that psychotherapy could be made relevant for Ugandans. Their dedication to this vision, and their considerable success in putting it into practice, figure as examples of how to move beyond critique.