The Creation of the Swiss Charter for Psychotherapy's "Declaration Concerning the Concept of and Requirements for the Scientific Verification of Psychotherapeutic Methods"

Abstract

The authors describe the process of the creation of the "Declaration Concerning the Concept of and Requirements for the Scientific Verification of Psychotherapeutic Methods". This document is the result of discussions, occurring over several years, between various training institutions of the "mainstream" analytical, humanistic and body therapeutic methods and the professional psychotherapy associations. This is the same conglomeration that founded the Swiss Charter for Psychotherapy 11 years ago. We clarify why the Charter is not conceived on the basis of homogeneity of psychotherapeutic methods, but on the basis of a heterogeneous mixture, without, however, falling prey to a spirit of "anything goes". The declaration delineates precisely what we understand as being "scientific". It summarises that conception of "scientific" which is currently the largest common denominator of the participating institutions. It also contains a section concerning the requirements institutions should meet relative to scientific standards and research. The requirements for establishing and maintaining a level of science that are within the framework of the state-of-the-art conceptions of scientific knowledge and theory are formulated and made transparent. The formulation of the declaration took a total of 3 years. At first, we organised a cycle of eight colloquia in the years 2000 and 2001. All of the institutions were equally entitled to submit, in accordance with explicit regulations, their understanding of and position on groups of themes relevant to the declaration. These contributions provided the bases for the formulation of the declaration, completed in 3 further colloquia. It was demonstrated that the deciding factor for the success of the undertaking was that the colloquia were embedded in a process structured by cyclic and recursive dialog. Thus, the whole of the text was formulated via consensus and, in its finality, could be unanimously condoned by all of the contributing institutions. The publication of the declaration served the purpose of exposing it to the public, providing the possibility of open discussions. With the awareness that no knowledge-system is comprehensive and absolute, well-founded reactions to the declaration will be publicised for examination as a basis for its future formulations. In this way, the declaration retains its dynamic characteristic via the recursive process.

Keywords:
Heterogeneous mix of methods; Quality control; Professional development; Process of dialogue; Self-organisation; Scientific; Psychotherapy research; Health care.