My Role in the Decolonization of Psychology

My Role in the Decolonization of Psychology
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My Role in the Decolonization of Psychology
Introduction
Oppression, poverty, and suffering seem to be aspects of the world that never change despite our democratic progress and realization of an expansive array of human rights. Poverty, for instance, is at the center of many problems (Knifton & Inglis, 2020): increased health risks, homelessness, substance abuses, and emotional and physical abuses within and without households. In other words, poverty may as well be one of the major causes of conditions that drive people into seeking psychological assistance. Since it never seems to end, across history, it is the major cause of inequality. Within public discourse, inequality is often discussed in refence to sectors like education and health. However, I think inequality has infiltrated the field of psychology starting with its inclination to Western society’s notions and perceptions to people’s inability to afford mental health services. Thus, in my opinion, the first step towards making psychology inclusive is decolonization.
The Balance Between Solving Societal Issues and Offering Mental Health Service to Individuals
As we know it, psychology is the scientific study of the human mind and its functions, especially those that influence behavior in a given context. Its purpose is to influence, change, or control behavior and to make meaningful, constructive, positive, and lasting changes in people's lives and influence their behavior for the better (Avais, Wassan, & Chandio, 2014). Thus, psychology is extensive, from organizations, mental health facilities, and community health. For me, this is where the dilemma is; we are coming from a history where people have been oppressed and continue to suffer through poverty and inequalities. We cannot deny that the legacy of slavery or issues like colonization and apartheid is not still with us. Indeed, Halloran (2018) argues that African Americans' poor social and psychological well-being can be linked to cultural trauma: a posttraumatic slave syndrome. Duane et al. (2020) talk about the concept of collective trauma: a blow to the primary tissues of social life that damages the bonds of attaching people and impairing their prevailing sense of community.
In other words, people are experiencing mental health issues as a result of wider societal problems such as inequality. Personal trauma, cultural trauma, and inter-generation trauma are part of what mental health providers are dealing with and is the essence of community psychology. It is clear that history of oppression, chronic poverty, and suffering is still with us (Tetzlaff, 2022) and affects mental health outcomes. Indeed, the current Covid-19 pandemic has worked to expose the world's inherent inequalities highlighted by how some countries have stockpiled vaccines while others have primarily unvaccinated populations (Fortuna, Tolou-Shams, Robles-Ramamurthy, & Porche, 2020). Understanding the root causes of mental illness requires critical inquiry into how broader relations of subjugation and domination play themselves out in the day-to-day life of people. I believe the role of mental h...