ABSTRACT
The last chapter demonstrated two difficulties which face us when we try to assess the psychological adjustment of someone who belongs to a minority ethnic group. Both are related to the fact that his problems are defined by the majority culture. The West Indian family, in common with families in other disadvantaged groups [34, 133], is regarded as pathological because it apparently lacks a father. The paternal role of guide and disciplinarian is assumed by others-by the magistrate, the social worker and the psychiatrist [103]. Black children are, nevertheless, well adjusted inside the family and their ‘pathology’ (delinquency) is directed outwards against the wider society [359]. The assumption that the family itself is maladaptive enables representatives of the majority culture to ‘enter’ it for the purpose of control. As with ‘sus’ there is concern with control and
surveillance in the absence of illness or crime in the accepted sense. Delinquency and behaviour disorders are moral rather than medical concepts and they more clearly reflect normative judgements. To isolate them as illnesses existing in ‘nature’ facilitates and legitimates their ‘treatment’ [448].
