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When I was studying medicine in 1971, I had an intellectual thrill when reading Svein Haugsgjerd's book “Nytt perspektiv på psykiatrin” (New perspectives on psychiatry). Here, many threads were knitted together like psychoanalysis, sociology, culture and politics. Everything mattered in psychiatry, where the goal was to understand and liberate patients from their sufferings. Now, 40 years later, there is a new Norwegian book with the same broad perspective on psychiatry and published honouring the 70th birthday of Svein Haugsgjerd. “Psyke, Kultur og Samfunn – Perspektiver på indre och ytre virkelighet” (Abstrakt forlag AS 2012) is edited by Sidsel Gilbert, Erik Stänicke and Fredrik Engelstad and includes contributions from 25 authors. The weave of psychiatry is still multicoloured and fascinating. There is also a hope that the battle about influence and power in matters of psychiatry is not lost once and for all to two- or one-dimensional pictures of man. In the preface, the editors say that the book hopefully will manage to express and pass on the ideas and work of Svein Haugsgjerd in an open-minded way, for inspiration and reflection by the younger generations.
The essays of the book come under five headings: 1. Psychological treatment; 2. Health politics; 3. Society; 4. Culture and 5. Work and Politics. In what follows, I will present one contribution from each subdivision.
Sverre Varvin, psychoanalyst, psychiatrist and researcher writes about “Indre og ytre exil. Flygtninger og psykoterapi” (Interior and exterior exile – refugees and psychotherapy). He gives a vivid picture of what it means to be a traumatised refugee. The loss of a safe haven called home is both interior and exterior. It takes long and hard work to help re-establishing security and self-esteem in the exil