ABSTRACT
In Kosovo, the class of local interventionists de facto has been creating new possibilities of explaining and understanding the past and present. However, this group of people with their unique position and expertise of cultural proximity, have to survive within a delicate tension between local and outsider imagined and actual realities. In effect, this group of local professionals has become the gatekeepers to resources. Most visiting experts expect these colleagues to make decisions about key aspects of their collaborative projects. There are several facets of the “dominant-discourse-vacuum” in Kosovo today. At the professional level, before the war there were very few mental health professionals in the province and the dominant discourse was that of medicalized psychiatry and institutionalization. In Kosovo there is a difficulty in delineating what is the precise meaning of “psychosocial” for the local communities, for the local professionals and hence for the international trainers, as well.
