Commentary: deconstructing critiques on the internationalization of PTSD

Abstract

When PTSD entered the DSM, advocacy for the diagnosis was a critical part of advocacy for Vietnam veterans. Over the next two decades, the range of contexts in which this clinical concept was applied increased dramatically. In a recent article in Culture, Medicine and Psychiatry, Breslau (2004) describes PTSD as a "prominent cultural model" to account for suffering as well as the synergy between human rights or political advocacy and traumatic stress advocacy. In this article I question the sequence of steps that Breslau took to critique the internationalization of the PTSD construct. I also question Breslau's critique on our work in Nepal. Finally, I will formulate some future challenges for psychiatry and anthropology to bridge their universalistic and relativistic points of view.