Therapeutic Communities: an Experience Report from the Perspective of Community Psychology

Abstract

This work is the result of an experience report that occurred during the discipline of Community Psychology, of the Psychology course of a Higher Education Institution (HEI). The report refers to a technical visit to a Therapeutic Community (CT) located in the middle of a medium-sized city in the State of Ceará. The main objective of this work is to present the perceptions found during the visit in question, establishing a connection with the theoretical framework used during the discipline of Community Psychology, proposing discussions about these entities. In the community in question, there is a perception of this environment as a “perfect” place, in which the total recovery from chemical dependence depends on the individual and this must be based on a tripod that constitutes the community: coexistence, work and spirituality. We understand the CT in this study as a sample of CT’s. The results of this analysis were essential for the monitoring process in the discipline of Community Psychology by one of the authors of this article, since the return of the field allowed a critical reflection on the phenomenon of TC's, enabling the identification of demands and possible situations that generate suffering psychic in the subjects inserted in this space. We can consider this phenomenon as a setback in the anti-asylum struggle, since it aims at a treatment that escapes any model of exclusion, in which the subject in psychological distress should not be segregated.This work is the result of an experience report that occurred during the discipline of Community Psychology, of the Psychology course of a Higher Education Institution (HEI). The report refers to a technical visit to a Therapeutic Community (CT) located in the middle of a medium-sized city in the State of Ceará. The main objective of this work is to present the perceptions found during the visit in question, establishing a connection with the theoretical framework used during the discipline of Community Psychology, proposing discussions about these entities. In the community in question, there is a perception of this environment as a “perfect” place, in which the total recovery from chemical dependence depends on the individual and this must be based on a tripod that constitutes the community: coexistence, work and spirituality. We understand the CT in this study as a sample of CT’s. The results of this analysis were essential for the monitoring process in the discipline of Community Psychology by one of the authors of this article, since the return of the field allowed a critical reflection on the phenomenon of TC's, enabling the identification of demands and possible situations that generate suffering psychic in the subjects inserted in this space. We can consider this phenomenon as a setback in the anti-asylum struggle, since it aims at a treatment that escapes any model of exclusion, in which the subject in psychological distress should not be segregated.