Trauma, Ethics and the Political Beyond PTSD The Dislocations of the Real [Hardcover]

The contemporary psychiatric approach to trauma, encapsulated in the diagnostic category of PTSD, has been criticized for its neglect of the political dimensions involved in the etiology and treatment of trauma. By means of a philosophical and psychoanalytical analysis, the depoliticizing potential of the biomedical approach is tied to a more general 'ethical crisis' in post-traditional societies. Via the work of Lacan, }i~ek and Badiou on the act and the event, this book constructs a conceptual framework that revives the ethical and political dimensions of trauma recovery.

This book deals with a series of problems associated with the contemporary psychiatric approach to trauma, encapsulated in the diagnostic category of PTSD, by means of a philosophical analysis inspired by the works of Jacques Lacan, Slavoj }i~ek and Alain Badiou.

1. Individualization, Decontextualization and Depoliticization in the Biomedical PTSD-Approach to Trauma

2. A Critique of the Ethics of Human Rights in its Relation to PTSD

3. The Lacanian Concept of the Real and the Psychoanalytical Take on Trauma

4. The Lacanian Concept of the Real in Relation to the Ethics of Psychoanalysis

5. The Lacanian Concept of the Real in Relation to Politics and Collectice Trauma

6. Act and Event: Ethics and the Political in Trauma

Gregory Bistoen is a Doctoral Researcher at the Department of Psychoanalysis and Clinical Consulting at Ghent University, Belgium, and a Clinical Psychologist and Psychoanalyst in Private Practice.

The contemporary psychiatric approach to trauma, encapsulated in the diagnostic category of PTSD, has been criticized for its neglect of the political dimensions involved in the etiology and treatment of trauma. By means of a philosophical and psychoanalytical analysis, the depoliticizing potential of the biomedical appl3