Making Sense of the 'Chemical Revolution'. Patients' Voices on the Introduction of Neuroleptics in the 1950s.

The so-called chemical revolution has produced a vast historiographical corpus. Yet the patient's voice remains surprisingly absent from these stories. Based on the archives of the Institut de Psychiatrie (Brussels), this paper traces the introduction of Largactil as recounted in patient letters, physician records and nurse notes. The paper thus contributes to the history of therapies from below, but also participates in the historiographical debate about whether the introduction of neuroleptics can indeed be considered a revolution.

The introduction of chlorpromazine in Belgium and the Netherlands (1951-1968); tango between old and new treatment features.

The introduction of chlorpromazine in Belgium and the Netherlands demonstrates an intriguing tango between old and new treatments. Chlorpromazine, marketed by the French company Rhône Poulenc entered psychiatry as an adjunct to existing therapies. Instead of promoting chlorpromazine as a revolutionary therapy, we see early efforts to market Largactil as a supplement to the armoury of psychiatric treatments. These marketing efforts matched the idiosyncrasies of national and local styles and cultures. Despite continuities with earlier therapeutic developments, we support the notion of a therapeutic revolution. In the early sixties supply and demand provoked a turn towards more standardized therapeutic regimes.

Writing the history of psychiatry in the 20th century.

As editors of the special issue, we try to summarize here the historiographic trends of the field.We argue that the field of research is accommodating the diversity of the institutional, social and political developments. But there is no narrative in sight which can explain the psychiatry of the 20th century, comparable to the authoritative coherence achieved for the 19th century. In contrast, the efforts to extend these narratives to the 20th century are largely missing the most impressive transformation of psychiatric treatment--and self-definition.

[A difficult stabilisation. Chlorpromazine in the fifties in Belgium]. / Une stabilisation difficile. La chlorpromazine dans les années 1950 en Belgique.

Through a Belgian case study the article tries to trace the gradual stabilisation of chlorpromazine as an antipsychotic in the 1950s. By varying ranges and angles of approach it shows the heterogeneity of actors involved and the semantic bricolage that accompany the marketing of the first antipsychotic. Far from being a revolution, the presence of Largactil in psychiatric practice is rather characterised by integration into a wider range of medicines and sinuous searching to give sense to this new drug.

[Change in psychiatry. The case of the Karl-Bonhoeffer-Clinic for Nervous Diseases (1960-1980)]. / Psychiatrie im Wandel. Das Fallbeispiel Karl-Bonhoeffer-Nervenklinik (1960-1980).

The 1960s and 1970s are often described as years of change in psychiatry. The profession encountered strong societal criticism: antipsychiatry, social psychiatry, deinstitutionalization are only a few key words. Based on a quantitative and qualitative analysis of patients' files this article aims at reconstructing these (inter)national debates and conflicts through an analysis of the psychiatric practices inside a German hospital.