[Towards a postcolonial psychiatry? The contemporary relevance of Frantz Fanon].

BACKGROUND

The centenary of Frantz Fanon’s birth in 2025 sparked renewed attention to his work. In recent years, his reception has shifted noticeably: from Fanon as a political activist to Fanon as a psychiatrist.

AIM: To offer a concise exploration of the historical significance and contemporary relevance of Fanon’s psychiatric writings, and to help make this body of work more accessible to a Dutch-speaking readership.

METHOD: A reflective discussion based on a literature review of both the primary and recent secondary literature, including a recent narrative literature review on Fanon via PubMed.

RESULTS

The renewed engagement with Fanon’s psychiatric writing provides a more accurate understanding of his role in the decolonization of psychiatry and sheds light on his radically innovative clinical practice as a psychiatrist.

CONCLUSION

Although formal decolonization largely lies behind us, Fanon remains a vital point of reference for social and transcultural psychiatry. His work continues to issue a postcolonial challenge to the broader psychiatric field: it calls for culturally sensitive care and reminds psychiatry of its societal responsibility to confront institutional racism.